Tower of Adamant
by PridakArbiter
Summary: Alexandria perished at the hands of the warlord Skitter, but awakes to find herself unharmed in a strange and alien land, the Nevernever.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: The End of the Hard, Ugly Road**

"And the numbers get better?" The Library of Alexandria, former PRT Chief Director Rebecca Costa-Brown, said, standing in the rain. Next to her was a small girl, about twelve years old, with short-cropped brown hair. She was sitting under an umbrella, and a small little dish of iced confectionaries sat on the table in front of her.

"Yes, much better if Skitter surrenders," Dinah Alcott replied. She nibbled on the confectionary in front of her slowly. Alexandria turned slightly to regard her, watching the dribbles of rain running down the side of her visor. Alexandria noted that Dinah was uneasy, but she did not detect a lie. No involuntary eye movements, no quickening of the heart, no facial expressions. She was telling the truth.

"If she's killed?" Alexandria asked, turning away, looking out at the rising dawn. Streaks of orange light crept across the sky, bringing light back into the world. She heard the rustle of cloth as Dinah's father reached for a confectionary of his own. Ordinarily, Dinah only gave predictions over the phone, but for this one, she had made an exception.

For good reason of course, since it concerned her savior, Skitter. Alexandria had relinquished her position as Chief Director, now only the Chief Deputy Director in the wake of the secrets revealed by Echidna's copy. It was something that Cauldron had not foreseen.

"They get worse," Dinah said, and her voice was much smaller, timid, compared to her earlier obstinance when she had demanded to see Alexandria.

"It has to be me?" Alexandria turned back towards the father and daughter and stepped away from the rain, back under the large umbrella. The rain had already soaked into the fabric of her uniform, making the grey tower on her chest almost invisible. She was not bothered by the cold or damp, her power having taken care of any physical discomfort.

Just as physical ills did not assail her perfect body, so to were physical joys muted, as if felt through a tough cloth. Only her supernatural awareness kept her from tearing the world apart, just as she carved grooves in the concrete walls of the room where she was reborn. Unbidden, a flash of memory flickered before Alexandria's eyes, of her own broken body, lying broken and dying upon a hospital bed.

"Yes," Dinah breathed, the words soft and silent, before continuing in an almost breathless whisper, "95.9 percent chance you die."

The confectionary that she had raised to her mouth tasted like ash, Alexandria noted, almost detached. She barely heard the shocked inhale from Mr. Alcott, as he processed what Dinah was saying. Even with her image tarnished, his entire generation idolized her and the other members of the Triumvirate.

Her voice sounded distant, even to her own ears, "The numbers are better?"

"The numbers are better."

Slowly, almost glacially, Alexandria nodded, turning away again as she did so. It was strange, she mused, she had spent years of her youth worrying about death, trying to come to terms with it. Hoping for a miracle, any miracle, and jumping on the one she was presented with. None of that prepared her for such numbers, '95.9'. In some ways, it was worse now, since it came upon her unexpected. Yes, she always knew that every Endbringer attack she flirted with death, but this was different. She had never gone to an Endbringer fight knowing that she'd die.

A flash of a pale white suit, a white fedora, across the street. Alexandria's crystal clear vision, granted by the vial she drank so many years before allowed her to see Contessa. She stood just under an awning, out of the rain. Contessa nodded. A sharp nod, expressionless, more machine than human. Still, it answered Alexandria's unspoken question.

For the first time in a long time, Alexandria felt like crying.

"Mother," the voice of a young woman spoke softly, just barely audible. The young woman stood over a feeble looking old woman. The soft, steady beeps of the EKG filled the hospital room. The old woman's eyes fluttered open, revealing dark brown eyes clouded with cataracts. Her eyes were set in a sallow, aged face. The years had not been kind.

"Becca?" She croaked, sightless eyes scanning the room before a ghost of a smile graced the old woman's face as she continued hoarsely, "I knew you'd come back someday!"

Alexandria, Becca to her mother, gave a strained smile. Her iconic visor and black costume were absent. She was clad in a crisp grey suit. No makeup was on her face. She looked exactly like her mother had seen her all those years before, albeit then she was the sick one, and her mother was healthy.

"Yes," Alexandria whispered, grasping her mother's hand tightly, but not so tightly that she'd hurt her mother, "I came to see you one last time."

A flicker of a frown graced her mother's face, evidentially she noticed as well that something was wrong with Alexandria. Still, she did not ask, and Alexandria was grateful for it. Even if the reason was probably that her mother dared not risk this meeting going sour.

"I watched every one of your speeches," Her mother said, staring at where she thought Alexandria's face was, "I told everyone that you were my daughter. I was always proud of you, Becca."

Alexandria let a small smile touch her lips, even as the nostalgia for times past threatened to consume her. It was a sad smile. The smile one gives to a loved one as they lie on their deathbed. Or perhaps the smile of one lying on their deathbed.

"I missed you mother," Becca said, letting just a little bit of the little girl that died in that hospital shine through. The little girl that had died so that Alexandria might live. A little girl who had turned to violence in order to save the world.

Was it worth it?

Alexandria strode towards the Brockton Bay Protectorate Headquarters. Her sharp eyes noted the insects, swirling in agitation. She paid them no mind, she had an appointment with death to keep.

Almost mechanically she went through the motions, threats slipped free from her mouth, but her heart wasn't in it. She knew she came across as even more callous than usual, as she delivered her Ultimatum to the teenager in front of her.

Somehow, she would die today. Most likely because of the teenage villain in front of her, Skitter. She wanted to rail against the injustice, to fight. Spit in the face of Dinah and Contessa. Spit in the face of death. There was nothing she wanted more than to live.

However, it had to be done, for the greater good.

As insects flooded her esophagus, and she felt her vision swim, even as the concrete parted like water around her, she was reminded of the sores in her mouth, so long ago, as she lay on that bed.

"_The numbers get better,"_ Dinah's voice flashed before her mind, as she plummeted to the Earth, cracking the asphalt beneath her. Spots of darkness flashed before her eyes. She could feel it as neuron after neuron flashed in death. Her mental acuity decreasing, it was a slow death. She knew from personal experience that it takes about two minutes to die from choking. She got to bear witness to three, her perfect memory took that long to fail.

For the Greater Good.

Was it worth it?

Yes.

As Alexandria died, she heard the crunch of snow.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2:**

Most people go through life without ever having to figure out what wasps taste like. Fewer people, but still a significant majority go through life without ever learning what spiders taste like.

Alexandria was now in the minority that had tasted both. She regained consciousness rapidly, one moment she was lying in the cold, slick, snow. The next moment she was on her hands and knees retching, just barely cognizant of the time in between. Of course, her perfect memory meant that she only had to think back and then the memory hit her full force again.

Insects, wasps and spiders and other bugs plunging down her throat. Filling her lungs, packing in until she had no way to breathe. She coughed, only bile leaving her lips. Through a haze, Alexandria looked at the white snow beneath her, spotted with bile. Why were there no insects?

And why was there snow? She had gone to her death on the 14th of July. Even in Brockton Bay, there was no snow in July. Slowly, Alexandria got to her feet, taking in her ruined suit as she did so.

She had gone to the negotiations with Skitter without even bothering to change out of the suit she had visited her mother in. After all, with the reveal of her identity, there was no point in bothering with staying incognito anymore.

Her expensive suit was torn, covered in concrete dust. Surprisingly enough, she still wore her black heels, even if they were scuffed and scratched. They didn't shine anymore. Alexandria wiped snow from her face and brushed off the suit quickly.

One thought dominated her mind, what had happened? The last thing she remembered was slowly dying, suffocating as her lungs were filled with insects. She vomited again, still bringing up nothing but bile. Shakily she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, before brushing her hand off in the snow.

It was truly a unique experience to feel such revulsion. She hadn't been sick since the Siberian killed Hero. She had never been sick after her return as Alexandria except in cases of psychological pain.

Her hand closed around a tree branch as she hoisted herself to her feet again. The branch broke under her grip, as she expected. However, instead of falling to the ground and laying in the snow like an ordinary branch, instead, it collapsed into a filmy goop which gradually evaporated away.

Alexandria stared at it for a moment. A shaker that created trees? Or a master, perhaps? She scanned the surrounding area, only now noting the grotesque appearance of the trees around her. At first glance, they looked like normal trees, but a closer look revealed that the trees were twisted into a facsimile of a tree. Roots didn't connect to the trunk, and pine needles shifted as if they were part of an animal rather than a human.

Alexandria stepped away, floating off the ground. She raised a hand to her ear.

"This is Alexandria, status report," She spoke, touching her earbud to transmit. A moment later she realized that her ear was empty, her earbud gone. She rose higher into the air, but not quite clear of the strange trees.

"Door me," she said quietly. She waited a moment before glancing around. She expected one of Doormaker's portals to open nearby, but that didn't happen. Instead, nothing happened. The world was still and silent. Just snow falling down into the strange trees. Alexandria rose into the air, higher and higher.

Clink!

A blur smacked into her, before careening off quickly. Alexandria startled, for just a moment she flailed, statuesque form impacting the branches around her. They broke with the sound of rough boughs snapping. She turned on a dime midair and cast her gaze around, looking for what just hit her.

A little ball of blue light, drifted away, down a suddenly appearing trail in the forest. Alexandria's mind flashed back to when she first appeared in the clearing. Her memory was clear, there was no path then.

"Door me," Alexandria tried again, making sure to keep her eye on the ball of light. Just as before, nothing happened. Her mind considered the possibility. Either Cauldron instructed Doormaker not to listen to her, or something else had happened.

With the memory of the bugs still fresh in her mind, Alexandria was tempted to say that something else had happened. After all, why would all the insects be gone from her lungs? She clearly remembered choking to death, suffocating...

Alexandria looked up, tangled boughs and tree limbs, all subtly distorted. She rocketed upwards, the air cracking below her. Finally, after a far longer time than it should, she broke through the uppermost levels of the forest.

A world tinged with white was revealed to her eyes. Barren and cold, no civilization in sight. Snow and frost tinged all things. The trees were bent over from the frost, deep snowdrifts covered the land, and even the rocky crags in the distance were spotted with snow.

"Door me," Alexandria tried yet again. She carefully looked around, but eventually conceded that there would be no door for her to escape this place. She looked up still farther. Her face twitched as she compared the starry constellations above to what she was used to.

Long ago, she had traveled the world, studying what the stars looked like from each corner of the Earth. The stars she was currently under were not Earth's stars. In fact, the only star that was in the right place was the North Star, and Alexandria couldn't even be certain that it was the North Star since all the other stars were wrong.

No, this could only be an alternate world of some kind, possibly another planet. One that even Doormaker couldn't reach. If that was the case, and she wasn't just trapped in a pocket dimension of some kind, then it was a wonder that her Agent even still functioned.

Of course, even if her passenger abandoned her she would still have her strength. She knew from experience with power nullifiers, that when she entered the zone of someone like Hatchet Face, she did not revert to an unpowered human. Instead, she would become an inviolate statue, dead to the world.

Alexandria descended. Since she had nothing else to work off of, then why not follow the floating ball of light?

* * *

Chapter 3:

Her high heeled feet floated just above knotted and gnarled roots. Alexandria frowned, the expression visible only because she was not wearing the iconic suit she had worn for most of her career. Her current suit, an actual business one, was iconic for a different reason, it was the same cut and style as the one she had appeared as the Chief Director of the PRT for nearly 18 years.

The main reason she floated above the ground and didn't walk was for two reasons. The first was that she could fly and there was no point in walking for someone like her except for when she didn't want to be noticed or for public relations reasons. Obviously, since she was deep in a strange forest neither of those reasons mattered.

The second reason she was floating down the path was because of the roots. To tell the truth, she had tried to walk in the beginning but the roots seemed to move on their own, constantly seeking to trip her. Of course, her strength and the nature of her power meant that such attempts came to naught. When she walked it was not with the strength of an unpowered, but the strength of her superhuman body, which was in itself capable of feats just shy of two million tons of force. Hence, she regarded the repeated attempts to snare her feet as barely an annoyance.

It had, however, made her consider where exactly she was and what exactly the forest was. Initially, she had considered the possibility that it was a cape, or perhaps she had somehow accidentally entered Sleeper's domain. Nobody knew for sure what was in Sleeper's little demesne in Russia, except maybe Contessa, who had been there before.

Theoretically, it was possible but Alexandria considered that unlikely. Doormaker's portals weren't activating nor was Doormaker even responding and Alexandria knew that they would still work inside Sleeper's domain. Cauldron had interacted slightly with Sleeper before after all, even if it was only Doctor Mother through Contessa.

She had also considered the possibility that a cape controlled the trees and maybe even the little blue ball of light that was floating down the trail in front of her. Slowly but surely matching her slow levitation.

Alexandria's frown deepened and she rubbed at the deep scar around her eye, the rough texture of the scar tissue not giving way at all under her fingers. She was careful not to press on the eye itself, the delicate tinkertech within was liable to break. By this point in her career, she had gone through several eyes, all purchased anonymously from Toybox's Cranial by Cauldron. Of course, Cranial needed to know who she was making the eye for, but Cauldron's ability to intrude even in the safe haven that was Toybox made sure she kept her mouth shut. The million-plus dollar payment also helped some on that front.

No, Alexandria decided, it was probably a cape unless the trees were part of some super organism in this other dimension. It wouldn't be the first time, there was the incident with Eidolon and the giant fungus planet on Earth Tzadei-7. A flare of amusement spread through Alexandria's mind, it had been an amusing read in Cauldron's reports. Additionally, Eidolon had been quite embarrassed at the time, which made the whole thing even more amusing.

That was neither here nor now. No. Alexandria only had herself, the forest and the mystery cape which was affecting her surroundings. Instead, she focused on the little ball of light. There was a more technical term for it, Will-o'-the-wisp. A ghostly light, which, according to folklore would lead travelers astray. Alexandria did not put much weight on ancient English folklore, but the name did fit.

The will-o'-the-wisp continued to float, it was unbothered by the grasping roots. Now that she watching acutely, Alexandria was able to notice how the tree trunks around her bent and swayed, slowly shifting, opening a path where there was no path before. She was being led somewhere. Most likely to something or someone.

A short distance later her suspicions were proven correct as the will-o'-the-wisp led her out of the grasping forest. Alexandria cast one glance behind, back into the dark boughs and knotted limbs before turning away, following the little will-o'-the-wisp into a broad field. It wasn't covered in snow like it was inside the forest, instead, there were only patches here and there.

Peat moss covered various spots in the clearing, which was spotted with grass and snow. Desiccated dead trees, many of them rotten and hollow showed that this clearing was once part of the larger forest. The trees looked more real here, and the roots didn't try and grasp at her feet.

The will-o'-the-wisp floated forward over the clearing, Alexandria started forward, her sharp eyes immediately noticed that she had been mistaken. The peat moss wasn't peat moss at all, instead, it was a greenish film, similar to duckweed but not quite algae. The will-o'-the-wisp had led her into a bog. How fitting.

Alexandria ascended a little higher, now floating more than a few feet off the ground. The clear supernatural folklore influences, from the will-o'-the-wisp to the grasping trees, were a little too much to ignore.

Alexandria's caution was awarded a moment later, as she spotted a ripple on the surface of the water. The wind was dead, no movement around her. No cries of swamp animals, no signs of life beyond the bobbing will-o'-the-wisp.

There was a distant splash and Alexandria turned her head slightly towards it, only to spot more formless bog. It stretched far over the ground, terminating at the base of the same rocky crags she had spotted after ascending within the forest. The bog itself was covered in a creeping fog, not high or deep but enough to enhance the otherworldly aspects.

Ker-plunk.

Alexandria pivoted, her center of gravity moving around one leg as she used her flight to turn in the air. There was nothing behind her except more bog and the dark branches of the forest.

She heard the rustle of grass, the sound of disturbed water and turned around, this time utilizing her full speed. Whatever was out there had no chance but to be exposed. A twisted mockery of a lobster was slowly easing its way out of the water. Two tall black eyestalks rested over a domed black carapace.

Alexandria flashed forward, her movement too quick for mortal eyes, seizing the over large crustacean by its claw with one indomitable grip and hoisting it out of the water. For a moment, all was quiet, as if the swamp itself was stunned by her passage and then it erupted.

Mottled and pitted black mutant lobsters crawled out from the water, claws snapping and letting out the most awful screeches. Alexandria grimaced, immediately reminded of the infamous monster producing cape, Nilbog. These creatures were not at all like what Nilbog made, these were deformed but appeared to be based off a real creature, in this case, lobsters or crawfish. Nilbog preferred the fantastical and based his monsters off creatures of legend, like goblins and gnomes.

Alexandria threw the mutant lobster she was holding, it soared away, landing in a distant part of the swamp with a faint splash. A splattering of black liquid, almost like an oil-slick covered her hands. The other lobsters gave no indication that they were bothered about the fate of their fellow lobster, and continued to attack.

Alexandria floated up and out of the way of the claws of the lobsters below her. One which had evidently managed to come up behind her even managed to scrape along the back of her heels with a well-timed swipe of its claws. It was all for naught, however, the lobsters were not very tall, and they didn't have any ranged weapons.

Instead, the water fairly frothed below her, as at least several dozen of the lobsters tried to reach her. They even tried to climb on top of each other to reach her. Alexandria was reduced to watching in distaste as one of the climbing one overreached and was subsequently devoured by the other lobsters around it.

Alexandria was already turning to float away, she had no need to stay and destroy whatever these lobsters were, but paused for a moment when the lobster's swarming ceased. As one they froze, almost seeming to dance in place on their many legs before slowly edging back into the water.

"Hello," A sickeningly sweet voice said. Alexandria had heard such a tone before during her many years as a heroine. It was the voice of someone that was most definitely amused by something but it was also not a pleasant amusement. It was the voice of someone that was gleeful, believing that someone had fallen into their trap. Or it was the voice of someone who was preparing a trap which they believed she would fall into. Alexandria's eyes narrowed as a figure rose from the water.

"I don't often get visitors, especially not here," she said, smiling slightly. Her smile revealed hideous dark green teeth, which looked almost black under the cold winter sun. Her hair was brown and green, and was both broad and thick, reminding Alexandria of seaweed. The main thing Alexandria noticed was the haunting but wrong beauty. The proportions of her face were off slightly, just enough to both appeal while appearing unearthly.

Alexandria stiffened slightly, despite the fact that it really made no difference to her body. This inhuman thing was either an alien or a changer. It wasn't a monster cape, she had made sure to memorize the faces of all volunteers, both before and after their vials.

"Who are you?" Alexandria asked, still floating out of reach. The cape below, if she was even a cape, just smiled up at her.

"Wouldn't you rather tell me your name?"

Alexandria paused, looking down at the creature below. What could it really hurt? Her identity was already blown, and by all indications, this was another earth, dimension, or planet.

Of course, she wasn't going to give her real name, there was no need for that. She had spent long enough escaping her old life before being forced back into it for the good of humanity. Instead, she was an ideal.

"I am the Library of Alexandria," Alexandria spoke, her voice softly carrying to the creature below her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3:**

The creature below gave a radiant smile, or at least it would be radiant on any other person than the loathsomely stained teeth of the creature below Alexandria.

It made to speak before pausing, then its face twisted as if had just tasted curdled milk.

"That's not your real name, is it," the creature asked, sounding almost petulant.

"No," Alexandria replied then, her voice echoed softly across the unnaturally still swamp. She could see from her vantage point several feet above the water the unnatural mist that crept ever closer and the ripples in the mire covered water. The strange lobster creatures were not gone but were evidently waiting at the whim of their master.

"I know better than to give my actual name to someone that asks for it as if it has value," Alexandria continued, glaring down at the creatures. A moment before she had almost given her name away, not believing that it had value on what was by all appearances another world. However, her reluctance had proved fortuitous, and Alexandria now suspected that the creature below had some power that required a name in order to use.

Library of Alexandria wasn't enough for it, but plain Alexandria might be enough. She was better known as Alexandria then as Rebecca.

"A name for a name?" Alexandria demanded, floating a little closer. The creature blinked pale eyes, the color of cataracts, earlier the creature's eyes had appeared as viridian jewels, even if the pupil was shaped like a cat's, now they were eyes fit for a corpse.

"No," The creature said, protesting, it seemed to be pained to even do so, "You did not give a real name."

"You did not ask for a real name," Alexandria's eye flashed below her visor. Her certainty that the creature had been trying to trick her somehow growing stronger, "you asked for 'a name'."

The creature scowled, "It wasn't a deal," it bit out, slipping deeper into the water, only its face was exposed now above the fetid swamp water. Alexandria heard a dull splash behind her but did not turn.

With a resounding boom, the limb of one of the rotting trees crashed into her shoulder, splintering into shards of wood, which in turn splattered into the goop that Alexandria had observed before.

This was an even more blatant attack than before and Alexandria was tired of this cape or creature's games. She darted forward, calling upon the speed and strength that her power gifted her even as the creature below sought to sink into the mire.

Alexandria impacted the water like a meteor, sending plant material, grasping giant lobsters, and algae-covered water into the air. Like a vise her hand closed around the creature's throat, pulling it upwards in one smooth motion. Alexandria took just a moment's extra care to avoid just snapping its neck outright.

It grasped at her hand, panic coloring its eyes, which had become a pale yellow, slit like a cat's. Alexandria also noticed the delicate tips of its ears, like a fantasy elf. The flesh purpled under Alexandria's grip, and the creature bit back the start of an echoing wail, not having enough air to pull in to continue.

Black claws and grasping chitin, combined with long tendrils of plant matter grasped impotently as Alexandria's legs, so she ascended higher again, not paying attention to the lobster which attempted to hold on before slipping to the hungry mouths below.

"Now you will tell me," Alexandria began coldly, "Where am I? What are you?"

The creature grasped with cold hands, Alexandria could feel that much, and ice crept across her arms. Alexandria disregarded such a pitiful attempt, a simple flex was enough to shatter the gathering ice, sending the razor-sharp shards to the lobsters below.

"I can," the creature gurgled, before cutting off. Alexandria loosened her grip just a moment, and then almost let go entirely as the creature's head seemed to burst and the body dissolved. As she felt the dead body slip through her fingers to the water below she glimpsed the moment in her memory. The creature was still whole.

With a grunt, Alexandria dived again, her superhuman speed just enough to grab the creature before it hit the water. Her eyes told her she was holding a corpse, her memory, however, told quite a different story.

"Illusion," Alexandria muttered, grateful for her thinker power, it has saved her from masters and strangers many times in the past, and it had saved her from releasing whatever this thing was.

"Tell me what I want to know," Alexandria commanded it darkly.

"Then you must make a deal with me," it rasped out, still twisting in her grip. Her hand was not as tightly around its neck as before, and the other arm gripped its arm, holding it aloft. It would not escape easily.

"No deal," Alexandria said, "Tell me what I want to know or I will kill you."

Alexandria was actually uncertain if she would. On one hand, the creature had tried to kill her, on the other hand, nothing it had used actually stood a chance at working.

"Don't you want to let me go? I know little of importance?" The creature replied. Alexandria's attention was drawn to its ruby red lips, a pink tongue licking them sensually. A smoldering look from the creature drew Alexandria's attention to her arm which was pressed up against the perfect naked breast of the creature. No trace of the dank vegetation from the swamp marred its porcelain skin. Its muscles were taught and perfectly formed, poised to fulfill many dark desires.

Alexandria took all this in and more, feeling the twinge of some long-ignored feeling inside her. However, yet again her perfect memory came to her rescue, her eyes deceived her yet again.

"I'm straight," was what Alexandria managed to say, before clarity returned to her mind, once she realized the unreality in front of her, the illusion peeled away, leaving only the inhuman and not quite attractive enough creature.

If Alexandria could interpret looks, which as it stands she could do quite well, the creature she was holding was glaring daggers with her. She could also detect fragments of wounded pride and lust in the creature's gaze.

"I mean what I say," Alexandria tightened her grip around the creature's throat, "Accept my deal, answer my questions, or I will end you."

The creature gurgled, pale yellow eyes bulging, the water fairly frothed below with the movement of the lobsters and vegetation.

"I accept," it gurgled, finally relenting. Alexandria held her grip a moment longer, just to watch the pain turn to panic, before relenting, relaxing her death grip.

"Three questions? Then you'll let me go free?" The creature asked, searching Alexandria's face. Alexandria very deliberately let no emotion show on her face, it was child's play for her. She had been doing it every day of her superhuman life.

"Those are the terms," Alexandria agreed.

"Thrice said and agreed?"

"Yes," Alexandria allowed.

"Ask," the creature relaxed.

Alexandria thought back, and decided to do exactly what the creature had tried to do to her, "Tell me your true name."

The creature stiffened, the sly look that had been growing in its eyes disappeared as if it had never been there, "No," it said, "ask a different question!"

"I don't think I will," Alexandria replied, tightening her hold, "You did not put any restrictions on the questions I could ask. This is one of my three."

The creature snarled, twisting in her grip, scales, and slime shedding from its body as it writhed, trying to escape her iron grip, illusion after illusion battered her body.

"Are you deviating from our terms?" Alexandria finally spoke, deciding she had humored the creature long enough, it stilled in her grip, becoming deathly still.

"I am Jenny Greenteeth!" It snarled, spittle flying from its mouth, it splattered against Alexandria's visor. Her lips twitched just a fraction as the fetid smell of swamp water came from the spittle.

"I see," Alexandria replied, "from the old English folktale."

The creature started to answer, no doubt interpreting that as a question so Alexandria tightened her grip, causing the self-named Jenny to let out a croak which sounded quite like a frog.

"So, Jenny," Alexandria said then, making sure to speak the name with the same inflection that Jenny put into it. She had found sometimes when dealing with very strangely named capes, repeating their ridiculous names back at them in the same tone they often used was often enough to get the most ridiculous ones to change their names to something halfway decent.

Jenny was one such name. Naming yourself after a mythical swamp-hag that ate children was just silly. Not to mention Jenny Greenteeth didn't even sound threatening, it did match though, with this creature's terrible teeth.

That, of course, led to the thought that even if the name was from a folktale that meant one of two things. First, this world had either convergent development with Earth or the name was a complete coincidence. That would be all fine and dandy, but Alexandria had repeatedly learned while working for Cauldron that 'there was no such thing as coincidences.'

"What are you?" She asked the creature, relaxing her grip just enough that Jenny could choke out an answer. Jenny's face was fairly blue at this point, from what Alexandria suspected was oxygen loss or throat trauma. It could be either.

"Sidhe," Jenny gasped, her eyes lolling in their sockets. Alexandria snorted, thinking, really playing up the magical swamp witch angle then?

"Where am I?"

"Winter!" Jenny screamed, just the slightest tightening of Alexandria's gauntlets to remind the creature that it was in her best interests to answer.

"Winter?"

"Three questions! We agreed!" Jenny screeched, clawing at Alexandria's hand.

"So I did," Alexandria replied. For half a second she considered just keeping the creature, forcing her to answer all her questions despite the agreement. However, with a pain of regret, she decided to be a better person, and relaxed her grip completely, dropping Jenny into the tide of squirming chitin below.

"So I did," She murmured once more to herself, eyes rising towards the clearing mist, where deep drifts of snow started in earnest leading away towards colossal snow-covered peaks.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4:**

Winter? What kind of place was this, that Winter was evidently enough explanation? Alexandria recognized the tone well, and that was part of the reason she refrained from pressing 'Jenny Greenteeth.' Jenny believed that Winter was sufficient guidance and that was in itself peculiar.

Winter was not a place, obviously, it was a season. Unless this very country in this alien world was called Winter. Or perhaps there was a town nearby called such?

Alexandria rocketed into the air, ascending. The air streaked around her from the force. Once she reached sufficient altitude she stared at the ground below. It had become shrouded in mist, the fog of war, Alexandria thought amusedly to herself.

She cast her gaze towards the sun, before stilling. The sun was not the sun.

Scion?

No, it was a chariot. A golden man drew it across the sky. A lyre and a bow were both strapped to his back. The horses that drew his chariot were gold, and glimmered as if a furnace were lit from within them. Or perhaps they shined with the radiance of stars. The important part was that the chariot was drawn by horses and it was at least a mile in the sky.

Alexandria paused. An explanation intruded upon her thoughts. Jenny Greenteeth was obviously from folklore. This 'man' in the chariot was the perfect image of Apollo Helios, ancient Greek god from myth.

"Am I hallucinating?" Alexandria muttered, taking a moment to rub her face in consternation even though it really did nothing to settle her nerves. She briefly considered the possibility before discarding it, master powers had almost never worked on her unless they were actual external illusions. Furthermore, since she had already discarded the idea that she was in a simulation of sorts there was no need to dwell longer on it.

The golden figure seemed to stare across the valley, one hand on the reins of the chariot, a light seemed to follow in his wake, not exactly part of the chariot but also not separate from it. The go

Alexandria watched for a moment as the chariot and its occupant sped across the sky. As the light of the sun, for what else was the chariot of Apollo if not the sun, receded into the distance Alexandria immediately became aware of the crack of thunder.

A stormfront. Dark clouds gathered, lightning flashing in their midst, snow swirling from them, hail the size of boulders. Nevermind the fact that lightning storms and snow didn't usually mix, it was happening before her eyes.

Crack-thoom!

For a moment, Alexandria could almost see a jagged line of lightning stretching itself across the sky. It brought to mind several parahumans she had fought in the past, such as Himiko in San Diego and Elon 'Tesla the Dynamo.'

Alexandria staggered, a flare of white light filling her eyes for a moment before fading in the next instant. She smelled something burning a moment later and glanced down. A little below her left breast was a starburst shaped burn that went right through her suit jacket and through the dress blouse beneath. She smothered the flames with her hands, letting the scent of burnt cloth subside. No reason to let all her clothes burn off. She idly remembered some of the more brazen costume mishaps from her youth, when she was both inexperienced and working with far less sturdy material than her usual super suit. As her lips began to quirk upwards, her mind flashed to a different moment of costume destruction and the smile faded. It seemed she had precious few fond memories, almost all were tinged with pain or regret.

She drifted back downwards slowly. Well, it was slow only by her standards, to others she probably looked like a blur. She thought about trying to outrun the encroaching storm but there really didn't seem to be a point. Where would she go? The possibility of rescue also still gnawed at her. If she wasn't able to call Cauldron would they instead check her last known location? If she left this area would she never get back?

However, more importantly, why would they look for her? She had served her purpose. She had died for humanity. Given her life, her whole life, so that others could live. It was a stark difference from the choice that she was prepared to make on the hospital bed so many years before. She would have given everything to live just a little longer. Anything.

A flicker of light, down below, for a moment she almost thought it was another will-o'-the-wisp, seeking to lead her astray. She almost snorted when she saw what it really was. Tinkerbell. It was a tiny little fairy, or pixie, to be exact. Alexandria remembered the proper name for the little flying people from a children's book her mother had read to her once.

She floated closer, keeping glacially still, like a statue. This was ironic in itself since she was quite close to a statue, probably as close as one could get without literally being made of statuesque material like marble or bronze. The little pixie didn't seem to notice her. It was a tiny little human with dragonfly wings. She had clothes made from pine needles, bound together with, sap?

She darted in and out of a little hollow in a tree with a little brush, painting the outside with white paint. It was almost absurd for Alexandria to observe this. It was a scene out of a little children's tale. A tiny little blue-haired woman with insect wings, living in a tree hollow, while wearing a dress made of pine needles.

The little thing said something to itself in a voice like ringing bells. Alexandria could almost make out words in its speech. It half-turned then and that's when it spotted Alexandria, its little eyes went huge and it darted for its hollow. However, Alexandria was even faster and to the little pixie's speed of a flying arrow, she was a bullet.

Her hands closed around the creature, grasping one wing mid-beat with a firm hand. Before raising it to her face.

Sparkly dust hit her right on the nose. Ice grew on her fingers, she flexed them just a little and the crystallized water shattered, falling to the gnarled roots below.

"Let go, you meany!" The little pixie said in a comical sounding voice while attempting to stab Alexandria's finger, between nail and flesh, with a tiny sliver of wood. It bent upon impact and the little creature tried to kick her then.

"You're a pixie?" Alexandria said flatly, looking straight at the irate miniature fairy.

"Yes! And you're a human. Now let me go, you meanie!"

Alexandria looked at her for a long moment, assessing something. The little creature was not nearly as threatening as Jenny Greenteeth and it wouldn't be any harm to seek verification…

"Where are we?"

The little pixie looked around, narrowing her eyes at the surrounding trees.

"I dunno."

Alexandria breathed out heavily, shaking her head in annoyance. She shook the little fairy lightly, "What is this place?"

"A grove of trees?" The little pixie responded when she recovered from the abuse.

"Be more specific!"

The fairy adopted a sly smirk, "You wanna make a deal?"

Alexandria pursed her lips, making sure the pixie saw just how unamused she was, "All right, I will let you go if you answer my questions. There, is that good?"

"No~" the pixie responded in a breathless little voice, "You gotta make a proper deal! With a reward!"

The pixie got a dreamy look on her face. What. That kind of deal worked fine with Jenny. Alexandria's hands dug through her pockets, looking for anything small to trade. Her fingers closed around a small butterscotch candy. She didn't even like butterscotch. That brought up another question, when did she last where the suit before visiting her mother? Her perfect memory supplied her with the parting hug she had shared with her mother.

Her mother knew she hated butterscotch. Must've slipped it into her pocket when they embraced. What a cliché. She pulled it out, the little pixie perked up from where it was hanging from her fingers.

"Candy!" it squealed. Alexandria just closed her eyes for a moment and shook her head. Was this what her life was reduced too, bargaining with fairy tale creatures and getting smote by what was probably the literal act of a mythological god?

"I agree to give you this candy in exchange for your answers to my questions, which are to be answered immediately," she enunciated clearly.

"Okie!" The pixie grinned like a little shark, grabbing at the candy which was just out of reach of her little hands.

She gave the candy over to the pixie carefully, it pushed the whole into its cheeks, which bulged like a chipmunk for a brief instant before the pixie swallowed.

"Ask!" The pixie crowed, flitting its free wing.

"Where are we?"

"I dunno!"

Alexandria sighed, this was going to be a long day.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5:**

"Are we in Winter right now?"

The pixie glanced around. Alexandria tracked the pixie's eyes from a snowdrift, then to a rather large pine cone with what looked like bone shards growing out of it, and upwards for a moment at the growing storm.

"Maybe?" The pixie said, then quickly added, when Alexandria graced her with a long-suffering look, "it's cold?"

"Yes," Alexandria responded dryly, "Is this the state of Winter?"

"Like Philadelphia?" The pixie asked.

"No," Alexandria was about to respond with an explanation, nevermind the fact that Philadelphia was a city, not a state, which she had given multiple times to her Wards about the difference between a state in the United States and state as when it referred to a country but froze as what the pixie said registered, "Philadelphia?"

Alexandria inwardly berated herself. Why hadn't she thought to ask Jenny whether she knew about Earth? Of course, her attempt at contacting Cauldron had failed so it likely wasn't her Earth. Or even one inside the cluster of realities that Scion and by extension the agents could access. She could be on real uncharted ground.

She returned her attention to the pixie, which was nibbling on her finger, or attempting to with its very sharp little teeth.

"Do you know how to get to Philadelphia?"

"No," the pixie said, half distracted, before launching into a very long explanation without pausing for breath, "But I heard from a Malk, who said that a Fetch told him that a younger Gruff said that his cousin's uncle's butterfly's grandfather once spoke to a troll that knew somebody that lived in the state of Philadelphia?"

"I see," Alexandria said, not actually sure how to respond. She actually didn't know what a Malk was but assumed it was possibly a type of fairy based on the context, and also due to the fact that the pixie she was holding talked to it. A Fetch was a psychopomp, according to myth, and would fit in with her theory that the creatures in this land seemed to be based on English or Irish folklore. Gruff… she wasn't speaking about one of the Three Billy Goats Gruff, was she?

"The Billy Goats Gruff?" Alexandria asked, already suspecting the answer. Know she wasn't just in a strange dimension based on folklore, she was in one based on children's tales. You know, she thought to herself, maybe this is a simulation.

"Exactly!" the pixie said then stilled, "But don't say their names, they might notice!"

Alexandria just gave the pixie a look, "They _might notice?_ What are you talking about?"

Of course, as the little pixie launched into a weird little explanation that involved echoing, power and the 'Nevernever' Alexandria was considering this information with her own explanation. So the Billy Goats Gruff were like the Clairvoyant then?

"-and that's when I told the meanie Malk to boil his own tail!"

Alexandria snorted lightly, then lifted the little pixie out of the rain and underneath her suit jacket, ruined as it was.

"If you stay with me a bit," she allowed, "I'll make sure you get some candy."

"Butterscotch?" The pixie asked with huge eyes, "Oh yes!" She clapped her little hands together and when Alexandria let go of her wing she zipped off back to her house. A moment later she was back, this time with a little thimble on her head and a new pine splinter sword.

"Yes, yes," the little pixie screamed flying right at Alexandria's face, who almost instinctively batted the little creature away. After a moment the pixie settled and crawled into Alexandria's front breast pocket, which thankfully wasn't just for show but actually had some uncharacteristic depth. At least for women's formal clothing.

"Do you know what the United States is?" She asked the exuberant little pixie, in between the pixie's attempt at giving a tour of the forest, which mainly consisted of 'that's the Malk's rock' and 'that's where the Malk almost ate me' and 'the Malk likes to hide there.'

"Nope," the pixie replied, barely pausing for breath, and Alexandria could feel her shift, trying to seek some comfort against the increasing winds, which Alexandria suspected were quite biting. Alexandria paused then and thought of another question.

"What about Earth? Earth-Bet?"

"Huh?"

Alexandria rolled her eyes, raising a hand to shelter the pixie as the storm finally reached both of them. A hailstone smashed into the back of her head where it fractured, sending shards of cold ice down her back. This suit is going to be completely unwearable by the time I find civilization, Alexandria thought to herself. Not that she actually needed clothes, protected from the weather as she was. Social constructs still needed to observed after all, for the betterment of most.

"Do you know where any humans are?"

The pixie stilled, "Why would a meanie like you want to know where humans are?"

Alexandria felt a little amused, and allowed it to color her voice when she replied, rhetorically, "I'm human, aren't I? Why wouldn't I want to find other humans."

"Un uh, you're not," the little pixie replied poking at her suit.

Alexandria was tempted to ask just exactly why the pixie seemed to think she was inhuman then just stopped to think about. She was currently flying under her own power, she had clearly demonstrated superhuman durability as well. To this… pixie… she probably didn't appear very human at all. So Alexandria let the comment slide.

"Nevertheless," she said loudly in order to be heard over the roaring winds, "You didn't answer my question, do you know where to find humans?"

The little pixie seemed to dither for a moment, fidgeting before answering haltingly, "I know a trail they travel on, them and the bloody ones?"

"A trail?" Alexandria replied, frowning, "where?"

The pixie looked out into the blizzard, peeking her little head over the rim of Alexandria's pocket, "ah, that way?"

Alexandria turned on a dime and began to float in that direction, careful to keep her hand over the little pixie to protect from the hailstones. More and more of them continued to break against her body, sending razor-sharp shards of ice, which wasn't acting like normal ice, flying everywhere around her. If she was completely normal, most of the stones would've killed her. As it was, it was a mild inconvenience, barely worthy of note.

"Is that it?" Alexandria asked as she spotted a thin column of figures below.

The pixie popped her head up once more, "Ye-yeah."

"Hmm," Alexandria said, they appeared to be a mix of individuals clad in the most eccentric combination of clothing. Not individually but as a group. There were a few in suits with what looked like some kind of short submachine gun that Alexandria was unfamiliar with. There were a few who looked like they were in military fatigues, she spotted the Colombian flag, and then there was one dressed in what looked like an authentic reproduction of an ancient Aztec Jaguar Warrior pelt.

"Those aren't humans, though, they're blood meanies," the pixie offered shrinking back into the pocket.

"What do you-" Alexandria cut herself off as something else came into view or rather something else. Interspersed throughout the people, which Alexandria had somehow managed to mistake for large dogs for a moment were horrific caricatures of humanity.

Large man-sized bats, with fur-covered bodies and skinny, flappy skin covered arms tottered around along the column. Honestly, they reminded Alexandria of some bio-tinkerer's creation, if they were more bio-tinkerers than Blasto or Nilbog. They both looked functional and deadly and worse of all, one of them had taloned hand clenched around a length of chain which led to a young man.

The man was young, maybe mid-twenties, by Alexandria's estimate and had red hair, but a rather tanned complexion. Possibly dye, but rather unlikely since dye was usually discernable to her. Nasty looking metal manacles bound his hands and feet and drove what looked like long nails into his limbs.

Almost detached, Alexandria noted how each time the man stepped and the manacles drew blood, the bat-things twitched towards him before restraining themselves. Blood meanies indeed.

The question was, what was really going on here?


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6: **

Her initial approach went unnoticed, hindered by the freezing hail and biting wind. Alexandria did notice that the more bat-like creatures seemed to be more aware. Whenever he drifted particularly close, one or two of them sniffed the air, looking rather confused.

They gazed into the howling sleet storm around her but didn't seem to notice her as whenever they looked she exercised the power over her body and became unfathomably still. One or two would have seen her but their eyes, much like the humans she suspected they derived from, were made to detect movement.

She closed the distance swiftly, as the small group, about twenty of the bat creatures, interspersed with humans and several 'prisoners' started up a mountain path. She waited, hovering just out of sight for a long moment. Her desires came to naught, however, since the humans and creatures seemed content to speak little beyond occasional monosyllabic words that were unfamiliar to her without further context.

It was when they were midway up the mountain path that she decided to actually find out more. She drifted closer, floating above them and to the side, before darting in and hooking an arm around the neck of the furthest back bat-thing when it moved its attention from behind the group back to the front.

Her strength insured there was naught released but a startled hiss and she was gone back into the howling storm. She did manage to hear startled cries as she moved out over the ravine the group was traveling along, where they could not see her.

She held the creature in a tight grip, it struggled viciously for a second, trying to twist and bite at her, but her grip was too great for a creature which seemed to warrant only a mild brute rating. It stopped when it realized it would sooner tear its own skin off than actually escape her iron grip.

"What are you?" Alexandria asked the creature, which still continued to attempt to flex out of her grip. She obliged it by loosening her hold just enough that the creature could figure out where exactly they were. As in, floating in the open air. It gave a startled growl and finally deemed to answer her.

In a Guatemalan Mayan dialect. A relatively isolated language with up to 21 different dialects.

This was unfortunate. Either she was in some parallel world where the Mayans ruled the world, or she was in South America. The possibility that these were just members of a cartel or worked for a drug gang also came to mind. Alexandria dismissed them, not all South Americans were drug runners, obviously, she had learned that much in politics.

"You speak Spanish?" She asked, her Mayan was extremely limited, after all, enough to recognize but not to carry out a conversation.

"Si," the creature growled, renewing its squirming in her grip.

"Then answer me, what are you?"

"Red Court," the creature snarled, snapping at her arm, she tightened her hold on its throat as its claws on both feet and hands scratched at her suit, in essence shredding them. Her modesty remained and the creature seemed to become more fearful when she did not even deign to notice its attempts to harm her.

Red Court. It sounded pretentious, like a gang. It also could be paramilitary of some kind, which the presence of the man in Colombian fatigues would indicate. It could also be some kind of NGO, non-governmental organization, but with such a name it was unlikely. Court brought to mind images of nobility which also implied strict hierarchy, which in turn meant that it would have trouble dealing with outsiders, outside the court.

"You were human once?" She decided to satisfy another suspicion. Originally she thought that the creatures were the local equivalent of a bio-tinkerer's work, but she had darker suspicions.

"Yes," the creature gnashed its teeth and tried to hit her face with a prehensile tongue, she grabbed it with her other hand, loosening her hold on its body with the other. It squirmed, being held up only by its tongue and a loose grasp on the scruff of loose skin on its neck.

Alexandria wavered a little as she felt something weird. The weird part was that she felt anything at all, the saliva glistened and seemed almost erotic for a moment before it passed. She shook her head, where had that thought come from? The tongue twined around her hand, the creature seemed almost more shocked now at her non-reaction, its pupils expanded massively in its brown irises.

"And you were changed into this 'thing,' she released her hold on the tongue, allowing it to slip back into the creature's maw, which glistened with drool. It struggled for another moment, its taloned hands grasping at the hand that restrained it.

"It's a blood meanie," her little pixie finally decided to weigh in, peeking her little blue-haired head up from Alexandria's pocket.

Alexandria frowned, looking at the creature in a new light. 'Blood meanie'? What exactly did that mean? In conjunction with the appearance of a bat…

"It drinks… blood?" She asked the pixie, shooting a glare of disgust at the creature, "Its a vampire then."

The creature, possibly a very weird take on a vampire, had completely stilled on the appearance of the little pixie and now it renewed its struggles, "Red Court," it muttered like it was actually important.

Alexandria dithered for a moment, then the Red Court creature made a swift handed snatch at the little pixie. Alexandria batted its hand away with her free hand, hearing the snap of bone as its elbow bent in a way it wasn't supposed to. She regarded it coldly for a moment before, just, simply, opening her hand.

It screeched as it fell into the maelstrom at the base of the ravine. It continued for a long moment, before becoming a pain-filled scream and then silence.

Alexandria decided that a more efficient use of her time was to confront the whole group. Yes, the vampire thing was able to use some kind of esoteric saliva-based attack along with its natural weapons but that had no effect so it was likely that the others attack would have similar effects. Plus the only other weapons she saw were normal, submachine guns and the jaguar warriors obsidian toothed club.

She quickly found the trail and followed it back towards the group she had been stalking. She heard them long before she saw them, they were speaking in the distinctive sound of the Mayan language. Their tone sounded worried, and she smirked, evidentially they discovered one of their members was missing.

She floated around the stopped group arriving at the front where the Colombian military officer was speaking to the Jaguar Warrior. She waited a long moment and then sat herself down on the surface of the snow, letting just a little bit of her flight keep her from breaking the surface, no reason to ruin her pants, as tattered as they were with snow.

She stepped out of the storm into the view of the two men. They each startled in different ways. The Jaguar Warrior's eyes bulged and he inhaled deeply, looking extremely confused. The Colombian officer's eyes darted to the scorch mark first and the unblemished flesh underneath and then to the rips and rents in her suit.

He spat out a word, raising a hand, in a gesture Alexandria was long accustomed to, a blaster.

"Ah Puch," the Colombian officer said and Alexandria juked sideways, a bolt of purplish-white energy leaped from the officer's hand and swerved sideways after her with uncustomary swiftness, where it impacted her shoulder. Instinctively, right before the bolt hit she raised a hand to cover her little pixie companion.

There was nothing for a brief moment, and the Colombian officer gaped like a fish, and then the threads of Alexandria's suit unraveled from the area splashed. A beach ball-sized circle was laid bare right on her side, leaving only the back of her suit still attached and the little pocket around the pixie that had been covered by her hand.

That attack was unexpected. It seems they did have an equivalent to capes.

The crack of the sound barrier breaking disturbed the two lead vampires in the next instance, as Alexandria seized the Colombian officer about the neck and rocketed into the air, up and up. Finally breaking the cloud barrier of the storm above. Then Alexandria let go.

A brief glance around at the sudden stillness, shock still on the vampire's face as it took in the sight, and then horror and despair as he started to fall.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7:**

Twelve seconds is how long it takes a human in freefall to reach terminal velocity. The vampire took three seconds to realize what had happened and an additional two to explode out of its skin in a frankly disgusting display.

It was way more disgusting than even Breed's trilobites. That was also saying an awful lot since Breed's power was pretty close to hitting a lot of primal fears in the first place. The flesh and skin seemed to slough off and a hideous black-furred, snub-nosed, humanoid bat took its place. Its hair was matted from what almost seemed like something resembling amniotic fluid. Alexandria hated it.

The fact that it was not actually human simply made things a little easier. Contrary to the reputation she cultivated as a dark knight in the underworlds of the United States and Canada, she didn't actually enjoy killing. For one, the press would destroy her if she actually indulged in blatant murder outside of rare circumstances, for the other, there was still a tiny shard of the little girl that had grown up believing the world was inherently good.

So she regretted what she was about to do even while she knew that it was the most efficient way to showcase her power. That was also partially justified by the fact that this creature had both struck first, and was potentially dangerous to her.

At exactly the twelve second mark she blurred downwards and cut the transformed bat creature, vampire, by the lapels of its military uniform.

She could hear the snap as its neck broke from the sudden deceleration, especially since she wasn't just catching the body but also pulling upwards with significant strength. She took a moment, barely a fraction of a second to cup her hand around the little pixie, still in her pocket, and whisper to it, "You may want to get behind me when I re-enter negotiations."

The pixie popped her head up, recoiled partially, and then stilled when she realized the vampire was dead, with huge eyes, she nodded jerkily. Satisfied that the pixie would be out of harm's way Alexandria returned to the group of vampires she was stalking.

They were not where she had left them exactly, instead, they had booked it. However, due to the fact that they had prisoners and hence were forced to take the path instead of attempting to scale the sheer rock and throw her off the trail.

It was a matter of moments to catch up to the new leader, which was still the Jaguar Warrior. She didn't waste a moment before throwing the broken but transformed body of the Colombian officer at the Jaguar Warrior's feet.

He startled back at her sudden appearance from literally thin air, since she appeared from the steep dropoff instead of indulging in the semi-normality of landing further down the path and then walking to meet the approaching vampires.

She could see the Jaguar Warrior's eyes flicker over the body, no doubt trying to assess what killed him. Due to the nature of his death, there was no outward indication. Alexandria knew from long experience that the unknown was the most dreaded thing of all. If the Jaguar Warrior had ample time to examine the corpse perhaps he would've been able to notice the lump on the back of the neck and realized that the cause of death was a broken spine. As it was, all he would be able to conclude was that his compatriot had just up and died.

"Your friend," Alexandria spoke coldly, gesturing slightly with a tattered and sleeved arm, "Was most impolite, I'm sure that you'll be more receptive."

Almost as if to accentuate her words, her little pixie friend flickered from her pocket and around behind her head, disappearing into her messy black locks. The vampire's eyes flickered from the little pixie, back to the broken body laid at his feet.

His eyes narrowed, he rolled a word over in his mouth for a moment, shifting his obsidian-toothed club as he did so. Finally, he spoke in what was badly accented English, it sounded like it was a second language, "What do you want, spirit? We have leave to travel through these lands."

"You are the Red Court, yes?"

"Yes?" The Jaguar Warrior responded. Alexandria noticed then the four men in suits behind the Jaguar Warrior. The look in their eyes was recognizable to her. Mastered thralls. A dreamy almost expressionless look was in their eyes, for all that they clenched their guns tightly.

The other revealed bat creatures periodically clenched and unclenched talons. The military officers, Colombian military to be specific, looked alert, but upon closer attention, their movements were stilted, jerky. Like someone or something using a body shape which they were accustomed too. Two of them did have rifles, FN FAL's, if she wasn't mistaken, which packed quite a punch.

"That man," she pointed at the man in the manacles, who had been watching everything attentively, suddenly paid way closer attention, his eyes narrowing over his gagged mouth. Now that she was watching from a different angle, Alexandria was able to note that he had blue eyes and a nasty looking cut angled down over his grey robes. It had been bandaged but badly. Even looking like someone that should be suffering from acute blood loss, the man looked oddly alert.

"And those women. What are you doing with them?" Alexandria continued, acknowledging the other prisoners, who had the same dreamy, almost dazed, look on their faces as the men in suits. Thralls. Now the question was, what made him different?

The vampire almost turned to look at what she was pointing at but stopped himself at the last moment. Keeping both eyes on her, the vampire replied haltingly, "The prisoners?"

Alexandria graced the Jaguar Warrior with a nonplussed look.

"Um," the Jaguar Warrior frowned, "They're prisoners?"

"The question I believe I asked," Alexandria replied, "Is what are you doing with them?"

"They are our prisoners," the Jaguar Warrior seemed to gain confidence, "We do not answer to allies of the White Council!"

White Council? That was kind of out of the blue. So now there was a third group, called the White Council. Probably what the prisoner belonged to.

She opened her mouth to reply when the Jaguar Warrior acted, trying to strike at her with his club while flinging a handful of coarse grey sand into her face. Alexandria slammed the club aimed at her head away, ignoring the agonized scream of pain as the Jaguar Warrior arms fractured in addition to the club splintering.

Alexandria tasted iron on her tongue. Was this supposed to be a poison of some kind? Alexandria, despite her best efforts, was unable to recall a toxin that tasted like iron. Did people here just carry around iron powder to throw?

She shoved the Jaguar Warrior to the ground, ignoring his startled growl as his flesh bulged. The thralls and military officers opened fire. The bullets had no effect, as she expected. She had been shot by hundreds, maybe thousands, of bullets in her time. As the gun's magazines clicked empty and they fumbled to reload she brushed her eye, letting a flattened bullet fall away from her eyelid. She knew her suit would be littered with even more holes, but any hopes for adequate decency had kind of evaporated at this point.

She did not allow them to finish unloading, instead, the air cracked as she pushed forward, her hand closing easily around one of the thrall's guns. Crushing the barrel with the same effort it took an ordinary person to ruffle a tissue.

Between the time it took them to blink she had already disarmed half of them in the same manner. One of the Colombian soldiers scrambled for a knife, the grey sheen as it slid free from its sheath indicating it was made of iron. How very interesting, Alexandria thought to herself.

The guns were modern, the Jaguar Warrior had a functional obsidian club and actually expected to use it. The modern soldiers, vampires in disguise they might be, had iron knives that went out of style long before Rome. An exercise in contradictions.

One of the vampires lunged forward, rudimentary wings flapping in its wake as it attempted to strike at her body with its talons. Its spittle trailed from its mouth.

Alexandria backhanded it hard enough to crack its cheekbones, it stumbled to the side and off the edge of the path. All the vampires paused for a moment to listen to their other member shriek all the way down.

Alexandria snorted and spoke, "At this point, it seems, negotiations have broken down. You're hopelessly outmatched."

She heard the crunch of stone behind her and would've whirled and caught the knife she heard being slipped from its holster but now was the time to cement her invincibility. The knife was driven into her back, where she felt it snap and the shock travel back up the knife to the wielder, who snarled in pain.

Then she did whirl around, catching the knife as it dropped. She tested the blade against a finger. It was actually iron.

"Iron. How…" She searched for a good word, "quaint."

The vampires broke. Slowly they all just decided to back away, "prisoners are yours," the Jaguar Warrior informed her, cradling his broken arm and backing away.

The man in the manacles attempted to say something but his speech was muffled by the gag. The vampires holding his chain just dropped it and backed away, trying to put as much distance between Alexandria and itself as it could.

"Your thralls remain," Alexandria decided to dictate.

One of the Colombian soldiers glanced at the Jaguar Warrior who looked very conflicted but nodded. Soon enough, all of the vampires had disappeared into the blizzard, continuing along their route but now lacking their prisoners and thralls. The thralls just stood there, blank looks on their faces. The man in manacles took the opportunity to glance at her, before beginning to try and undo his binds.

Alexandria cocked her head to the side, still standing atop the snow, and listened closely. She could swear she heard hounds in the distance.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8:**

She listened for a long moment to the distant baying of the hounds. Frowning, she shook her head, dismissing the far-off hunting dogs. She was half-tempted to depart and try to find them but she had a new responsibility. Instead, she stepped forward, towards the man in the grey cloak, who regarded her cautiously.

"I am… Alexandria," she spoke, watching the man's eyes carefully. There was no reaction to indicate he knew of her. Yet another indication that she was in another world.

She reached out with both hands and seized one of the manacles, the man seemed to flinch backward. Her thumbs squeezed under the metal and in one smooth motion, she pulled them apart, the metal deforming like taffy. She reached for the other, the man seemed frozen as if he couldn't quite decide what to do.

The other manacle was just as easy to remove, the metal pulling away, allowing her to safely pull it off without the thorns digging in even farther. Once free, the grey cloaked man's hands went immediately to the gag and tore it out. It wasn't just the cloth on the outside but a proper gag. A wad of cloth inserted into the man's mouth.

The man just stood there for a moment seeming unwilling to say something. If that was the way he was going to be then… Alexandria turned and walked over to the thralls. The vampires had taken the ones in the suits, leaving only the three brain-dead looking female thralls. They were comely looking and might have even been beautiful without the bruises and vacant stares.

"Can they be fixed?" She decided to ask the man, who was still eyeing her warily.

"It's possible," he allowed, then continued, "I feel I must thank you, on behalf of the White Council, for your assistance."

White Council? How interesting. No wonder the vampires thought she was allied or part of the White Council if this man was part of them.

"The White Council," she said out loud, musing. Was there a White Court as well? Or a Blue Council. Odd that out of the three groups she first came across in this world, two were named after colors.

"Yes," the man replied, shifting on his feet, he glanced off into the distance where the sound of the hounds had come from, not long ago, "I'm a Warden of the White Council."

Warden sounded like a position and the man held himself with obvious pride at that statement, which added a certain gravitas to his words.

Her pixie friend decided to make itself known then, fluttering out from her hair and circling the area, "You said you'd give me candy."

"Yes," Alexandria smiled, then turned to the Warden, who was still facing towards her, and asked, "Do you have any candy for my companion?"

The Warden swallowed, his blue eyes looking slightly panicked for a moment before he seemed to realize something and said slowly, "I might."

He shoved a hand underneath his grey robe and dug in his pockets for a moment before extracting a single solitary Hershey's Kiss, badly misshapen, probably by his body heat. Alexandria floated off the ground towards him as the little pixie grabbed ahold of her hair and made an 'onward' gesture.

"Wait," the Warden said, swallowing again slightly, his eyes resting on her nose now that she was so close to him. Then it drifted downwards a little farther for a moment then snapped back up, taking in Alexandria's raised eyebrow, "If I give you this, would you consider my debt to you fulfilled?"

Alexandria snorted, what exactly was he trying to say? That this half-melted Hershey's Kiss would be adequate reimbursement? She didn't need any reimbursement, saving him and freeing those thralls was payment enough.

"For this pixie, yes, after all she led me here," Alexandria said with amusement, even though she didn't let that color her tone, "As for me, saving you served a greater purpose of mine."

"Tell me, Warden," She continued as the Warden seemed to stand there woodenly. The pixie looked left then right and darted forward, grabbing it from the Warden's hand before darting back over to Alexandria's shoulder. She shot a glance at Alexandria who nodded fractionally in permission as then continued to speak, "What exactly did the Red Court want with you? Speak truthfully."

The Warden just stared at the Hershey's Kiss as if disappeared into the pixie's gullet, tin foil and all.

"I'm part of the attache assigned to Wales," he began before Alexandria interrupted.

"Really?"

The Warden's eyes flickered away for a split second and Alexandria narrowed her eyes, "Tell me the truth, not a half-lie."

"I was in Wales!" The warden protested, before sighing, "But I'm not stationed there, I'm an attache at Archangel."

Archangel? Russia?

"Why exactly did the Red Court want you then? This doesn't look like Russia," Alexandria continued sardonically. Of course, she wouldn't admit it but this kind of looked like Russia with the snow and storms. The mythological creatures, however, were not familiar.

"Don't you know? The Red Court and the White Council have been at war for months?"

"Have they," Alexandria asked to cover up her ignorance. This seemed a touch more important than just a gang war. For one, gangs didn't generally span over multiple countries to such an extent that their agents could travel to Wales when they were living in Russia. Also, gangs usually didn't have attaches, that was a diplomatic function.

Alexandria was forced to consider the fact that these 'Red Court' and 'White Council' were either major international organizations or were actual countries in themselves. Her thoughts were interrupted again by the distant calling of the hunting hounds, it sounded like they had treed something. Good for them.

Alexandria turned away, surveying the raging storm around them, which seemed to be dying out. Its gales were less furious and the hailstones lighter. She turned away, foot catching briefly on the iron knife which was left behind by the vampire that tried to stab her. She bent down and pulled it free from where it rested, just barely in the snow.

It was well made, for a blade made of raw iron, wasn't that also called pig iron? She absently mindedly kneaded the knife for a long moment, deforming the metal. The question was, what should she do. Arguably she had just involved herself in what might be an actual international war, either between countries or organizations.

"You!" She barked out, turning back towards the Warden, who looked suddenly nervous, "Do you know where we are?"

"The Nevernever," he replied, frowning.

She had expected 'Winter' as his response. Either she had crossed a border somewhere, which granted, had happened before. No, Kurt, she thought in her head, the incident in Bolivia didn't count. Or this land was known by different names. Perhaps Winter was a state in a country as the pixie suggested.

"Do you intend to leave the Nevernever?" She finally continued.

"Yes…?" He responded after a moment, still frowning, "If I may be blunt, what are you?"

Alexandria looked out into the gale, and considered how to answer that question, before settling on something vaguely philosophical, "I am nothing anymore."

Her purpose was fulfilled, her meaning, her entire life's purpose, snuffed out at the start of her fall from grace. Once she had been the perfect symbol of a nation. A brave young leader of the most powerful government agency on the planet. Or from the other side, one of three of the most powerful real heroes in the world.

Then…

"Echidna ruined me," she continued, more to herself than to her audience. It felt good, almost, to say it out loud. It was then when her clone revealed everything she had done while casting it in the worst light possible, that she could say her image had truly died. Yes, the people still admired her, but it was tainted admiration. Acknowledgment that she had been a great hero but was no longer.

The Warden regarded her with an inscrutable gaze when she turned back to him. The hounds were a lot closer now, "If I may," the Warden said, gazing up the sheer cliff, towards the baying, "We should probably run, I think those are for us."


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

For a pregnant moment, all was silent, the wind and snow swirled around both Alexandria and the Warden. Then a hunting hound howled, and Alexandria cast her gaze upwards, up the mountainside.

An umbral animal, vaguely reminiscent of a wolf, crouched, staring straight down. Its claws gouged into the solid stone as it crept down towards them, belly pressed against the crags.

"I suspect," Alexandria murmured just loud enough that the Warden and her little pixie companion could hear, "That they have already found us."

The pixie tugged at her hair, hiding within, sparing just a moment to inform Alexandria in a very frightened voice, "It's _her_!"

Her. Said with emphasis. She doubted it was the dog, even though she supposed it could be, possibly. More likely this was the hound master behind the hounds, the hunter behind the dogs.

The hound itself seemed to notice that Alexandria had noticed it and froze, claws sinking deeper into stone. The stone itself sprouted grey lichen which curled around the claws as if it was some kind of sticky winter version of sundew.

Her own hubris directed her next statement, a hubris which she recognized and disregarded in the same thought, "Warden, lead these thralls to safety, I will speak with our hunter."

The Warden's eyes shifted, following her gaze upwards towards the still and silent hound, crouching on the cliffside, watching them with dark eyes.

He swallowed, hand grasping for a weapon that was not by his side. He glanced at her, then and nodded, seeming to steel himself, "I will owe you for this."

The words seemed to hurt him, he almost looked like he would like to retract his statement as soon as the words left his lips. Second thoughts, perhaps. Alexandria regarded the whole interaction curiously from the corner of her eye. Based on both this statement in conjunction with her earlier interactions it was clear that oaths, promises, and perhaps debts seemed to be somewhat more culturally significant then she had first suspected in this new world.

She allowed a half-nod, sparing a quick glance away, to look over the thralls, "take one of the guns."

The Warden nodded, placed a hand on one of the thrall's shoulders and tried to guide her away.

"My, my, so quick to depart with the prize?" a low, almost unpleasantly sibilant voice, carried softly to them.

Alexandria spun, gazing further up the path, a tall pale woman stood, half concealed by the swirling winds. Her garb was a simple blue dress, which seemed carved from exquisitely crafted ice. Her hair was the color of blood and seemed to shimmer softly, drifting in a different gentle breeze than the gale currently buffeting both the Warden and Alexandria. Her eyes were a vibrant green, inhuman and slitted down the middle like a great cat.

She smiled and her teeth were both too white and too sharp at the same time.

"Leanansidhe," The Warden breathed out the name in a half-horrified whisper.

The newly named Leanansidhe cocked her head, revealing a stereotypically pointed ear. A pale and pointed ear that wouldn't be out of place on a fantasy elf. If the Gaelic name, slit eyes, and appearance didn't give her away as inhuman, the ear certainly did. Still, it turned out it was a name that Alexandria had heard before.

"The Muse?" Alexandria questioned, slowly floating forward to be between her and the thralls. She could dimly hear the shift of snow, the sound of claws on rock as the hounds circled. They treated the sheer rock walls as if they were nothing, claws easily finding purchase as if they were mountain goats.

The Leanansidhe smiled, a cruel nasty smile, that whispered of twisted thoughts, "On occasion."

"Big, big, meanie," Alexandria's little pixie whispered. The Leanansidhe seemed to hear that even at their current distance, and her eyes darted to the side of Alexandria's head, to the hanging hair which the pixie was hiding behind. Still, the Leanansidhe kept her smile. Alexandria wished that the Warden knew Protectorate hand signals, or that she had a sub-vocal radio to communicate with her ally of convenience.

The way the Leanansidhe held herself spoke of confidence, and the way her eyes flitted over the broken Red Court's body without a pause, revealed that she at least knew of some of Alexandria's capabilities and chose to confront anyways.

Either she was overconfident or knew something that Alexandria did not. A hidden trump card. Alexandria was further discomfited by the similarities between this Leanansidhe and the Siberian. They moved with the same predatory grace. The same kind of almost animalistic hunger peered out from their eyes.

"Your… interaction with Jenny Greenteeth did not go unnoticed, Library of Alexandria," the Leanansidhe lilted, moving closer across the piled snow. She left no marks behind, even though her feet clearly touched the snow's surface.

Alexandria shivered slightly, not from the cold, but from the way her name was said. The intonation, the emphasis, it was as if she had said it herself, the same tone, of whimsical longing, and hidden will. It was her name.

Yes, Alexandria realized at that moment that she had probably been correct. Names did hold some kind of power here. Something almost intangible.

"The Red Court claimed they ventured here with Winter's leave," Alexandria said authoritatively, trying to regain some of her balance. The Leanansidhe of legend was sidhe, and most likely Unseelie at least according to the poet Yeats. Unseelie were traditionally the dark elves or of winter's get, the coldest and darkest time of the year.

The Leanansidhe smiled beatifically, a short immaculate breath out blew a strand of wavy red hair from her face. Even that slight fleeting imperfection was enough to enhance her beauty, "They are simple creatures, taking my Queen's inaction as evidence of permission."

Her eyes shimmered, almost appearing a pale yellow, "There impudence has been rectified."

There was a lot to unload there. An unspoken acknowledgment that she, the Leanansidhe, did, in fact, belong to Winter, and that Winter was, in fact, a country, which also had a monarch. More explicit, the rest of the vampires were dead. Alexandria spared a glance at the looming hounds, closer than before. Or they suffered a fate worse than death, consumed by beasts.

"I see," Alexandria nodded shallowly, reorienting her gaze back towards Leanansidhe, "and if I desired safe passage through this land, Winter, for these companions?"

"My, my," The Leanansidhe smirked, pink tongue licking red lips, "It would behoove you to make a deal, mayhaps."

"Why should I deal with you and not your Queen?" Alexandria asked, her mind already working through what kind of power this creature in front of her seemed to have, "Or I could force you to let us pass."

"A deal would be kinder to you," The Leanansidhe smiled then, as cold and nasty as before, "Or you might find secrets you hold dear revealed, child of Eden's Garden."

The warden beside Alexandria, who was already breathing shallowly, in the beginning stages of a panic attack, choked, turning to look at her with wide eyes.


	10. Chapter 10

**AN: Not sure if this really satisfies me, might come back and edit it some later. Writing Leanansidhe is tricky, and fae, in general, is quite a bit more challenging than I expected.**

Chapter 10:

Alexandria's eyes narrowed imperceptibly, even as her body hung frozen, floating centimeters off the freezing snow. A single crystal snowflake drifted down and landed on her exposed breast. Almost seeming to amplify the sudden silence that seemed to permeate the mountainside.

Leanansidhe was tense, the slightest of slight quivers on her back leg, helping to poise her in the perfect stance to spring away, to dodge an attack. Alexandria mused then, this was something that the Leanansidhe thought would provoke a reaction, but why?

She considered the creature before her. Her first thought, of course, flew to the biblical Garden of Eden, after all, she seemed to be in some kind of strange world where myths walked amongst men. Vampires, fairies, Leanansidhe, Jenny Greenteeth. However, why refer to her as a child of Eden's Garden?

This phrase was not applied to the Warden beside her so it meant something else than human unless it was a general term used by the inhuman creatures that dwelled in this world. As soon as Alexandria's mind reached this thought, another spun away, what if this creature was talking about something else?

The idea that it was a title that seemed to apply to her and not to the Warden implied that there was something different between the two. The only real difference seemed to be parahumans. Thus the Garden of Eden…

If Alexandria had less immaculate control over her body she would've twitched bodily in sudden realization. Was this creature alluding to Cauldron? In an extremely roundabout, metaphorical way, Alexandria could sort of see the deceased power-giving flesh of Scion's counterpart as some morbid Garden of Eden.

After all, its death brought true knowledge of the Enemy.

More importantly, this was merely an allusion that the Leanansidhe seemed to be making, it spoke more of fishing for information rather than actual legitimate truthful knowledge. Still, Alexandria considered her response. Still, she could be vague and symbolic in kind.

"The flesh was vile, was it not?" She spoke aloud, finally responding to Leanansidhe's question. Her question was poised, similar to Leanansidhe's own question, in an almost rhetorical tone. A tone that hinted at double-speak, and layers within layers. It was a question that was clearly worded as a test. She answered as if Leanansidhe's question had been a code phrase, and Leanansidhe clearly noticed.

Something dark flickered behind Leanansidhe's yellow eyes before yellow gave way to green. No, Alexandria sighed quietly in her mind, Leanansidhe had been only guessing at something which still was not clear.

"I will deal with you, muse," Alexandria continued, recognizing that Leanansidhe was either unwilling to reveal that she did know more, or was unwilling to reveal that she had been outplayed.

Leanansidhe smiled again, "Knowledge in place of safe passage? Is that what you wish to offer?"

Scowling Alexandria regarded Leanansidhe coldly, before replying, "Do you have the power to bar our passage? Or do you overstep your authority?"

Leanansidhe cocked her head to the side, stepping closer softly over the drifting snow, now she was barely a dozen paces away.

"I am second within Winter," Leanansidhe spoke, amusement clear in her voice. The way this was said implied some hidden facet that Alexandria had just revealed, and it grated on her to have given something away. A hound up upon the cliff's face growled, the sound carrying down to Alexandria. Still, this was exceedingly valuable information. She wasn't dealing with just the border patrol, but with somebody that apparently if they were to be believed, had legitimate sway within this state.

Alexandria could, she supposed, go to war with the entire state. No, she had been surprised by even one of the vampires. Leanansidhe had dealt with several. While she doubted Leanansidhe could actually deal with her, or even that the hounds could bite through her invulnerability, she had innocents to protect.

In other, more recent, circumstances she may have dismissed them as acceptable collateral. At this point, she had no reason to be overly antagonistic, especially when she really didn't have a clear reason to be so.

"What kind of knowledge would you ask of me?" Alexandria asked, her firm voice carrying easily through the still abating gale-force winds.

"Perhaps your Name?" The Leanansidhe spoke sweetly, seeming to savour the words, rolling the syllables. Alexandria almost considered saying yes, and then giving the same response she gave to Jenny, but something stilled her. The emphasis Leanansidhe put upon name, made it mean something more than just a pseudonym, and she had already realized names held some kind of hidden power here.

"No! Don't!" Alexandria's pixie wailed, suddenly tugging on Alexandria's hair. Alexandria raised her hand, easily plucking her diminutive friend from the air and held her securely.

"Do not mistake me for a fool," She replied, letting just the slightest touch of derision enter her voice, just enough that the Leanansidhe could pick up on it. Not enough to encourage outright anger.

Leanansidhe's eyes gleamed and she approached closer again, covering half-a-dozen paces before stopping, examining Alexandria with a sharp gaze.

"Something else then?" she spoke easily, and Alexandria seemed to notice then the way her red lips pursed almost lewdly as she ended her sentence. It was a simple action and shouldn't appear suggestive, but it was. Alexandria very pointedly did not deign to react at all.

"A favour?"

Alexandria might've accepted. Favours were always somewhat of a nebulous concept anyway. However, she noticed the way her companion, the Warden, who had been pretty panicked throughout their brief exchange. He shakily drew in a sharp breath of surprise, tinged by fear.

Leanansidhe regarded her for a long moment, "These thralls then…?"

The Sidhe softly smiled. Softly smiled with a mouth of suddenly jagged teeth above too red lips.

This whole conversation was filled with landmines, it seemed. Giving names was dangerous, giving promises seemed equally dangerous. Her little fairy friend whimpered, and Alexandria released her from her grip, where she spirited back to hide in her hair. However, it seemed clear that Alexandria needed to exchange something and she really didn't have anything to exchange.

"I will answer one question of yours, Leanansidhe," Alexandria declared suddenly, opting to try and retake control of the conversation. This was a dangerous game she was playing, and knowledge seemed like it could potentially be the least harmful outcome.

"Truly?" Leanansidhe seemed to start in surprise if the extremely minute twitch of her incarnadine eyebrows was any indication. Slowly, a malicious expression crawled across the Sidhe's face.

Alexandria quickly hastened to add, almost sensing the danger inherent in that moment "I will reserve the right to veto any question… if it is harmful to me or others."

Already she was having second thoughts, after all, she had an awful amount of hidden secrets. Her closets, as some would say, had hundreds of bodies. Slain in the name of the greater good.

A little voice, deep in the darkest recesses of Alexandria's mind whispered, you've made a mistake.

"Thrice said and done?" Leanansidhe broke the silence. Out of the corner of her eye, Alexandria could see the Warden shaking his head trying to get her attention without attracting Leanansidhe.

Alexandria ignored him.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11:**

In the end, everything that Alexandria had ever done had been for the greater good of humanity. The deaths, the assassinations, the railroading of innocents. All done for the greater good. Oh, how it galled her sometimes, especially early on, when she was forced to condemn innocents as villains just to maintain Contessa's optimal models for human survival. She had admired Hero and Legend, her counterparts, for their sheer determination to always do the right thing, no matter the cost. Of course, neither of them knew the whole stakes involved. That the choices were fundamentally binary, humanity would have a chance at surviving, or it wouldn't.

The choices were black and white. Not many shades of grey like others proclaimed. Now, this didn't actually connect back to what most people used the black and white analogy for. This wasn't talking about morals, just pointing out that no matter how repugnant an order or action, it was necessary that it be done.

It must also be said that Alexandria completely suspected that she might actually be making a mistake. The way her human companion, the Warden, tried to gain her attention, up to almost grabbing at her arm but aborting the action less than a few centimeters from contact made sure she knew.

The way the Leanansidhe's eyes gleamed, having returned to a fully yellow hue. A hue that only served to accentuate the growing inhumanness of her intellectual adversary. She had great knowledge of contract law, even skimmed through countless law books with her eidetic memory. It had been invaluable knowledge in her early days as a lobbyist, before she ascended as head, chief director, of the newly minted Parahuman Response Team. She fully realized that she could probably recite from memory a full contract, with subordinate clauses and exceptions to direct this proposed exchange of knowledge.

She didn't do it. Part of it was because she was tired. What felt like decades of long work, always completely besotted by decisions, legalese, and ultimatums. She never felt actually tired, in either body or mind, each continuously worked the same, no matter the stress or hours. What really wore on her were the moral questions.

Intellectually, she knew she was a bad person. Sure, everything she did was for the greater good, and if humanity survived it would be ultimately because of her great sacrifices. However, despite how she daydreamed of being deified as a hero of the ages, like countless before, it was not to be. Despite Doctor Mother's assurances and empty platitudes, Cauldron's actions deserved some kind of reckoning after everything was over.

She deserved punishment, penance. In the darkest of days, where she made the most ruthless decisions. The innocent faces of children flashed before her mind's eye, just one of many atrocities she allowed in the name of the greater good.

She was unholy. If heaven existed, she had fully expected to be condemned to hell for her deeds. In the end, however, despite how it grated upon her, it had been her ultimate choice. She was the one that paved the road to hell with her good intentions.

All this inner chastisement was what drove her to say the four words, the Leanansidhe asked for, "Thrice said and done."

The words tasted bitter, and Alexandria wished she could take them back as soon as they left her lips. For a woman that had defied all obstacles, to admit defeat even in such a minor way stung.

Alexandria also knew that her ability to defend the frail ordinary humans around her was limited. She also knew that she had served her purpose, and died for her cause. Her usefulness for Cauldron had finally run out, just as she dreaded in the dark days after Hero's prodding impeded their aims too much.

She had no real purpose left, save to see about the betterment of humanity. Any private goals or aspirations had long ago been discarded as she was pulled deeper into Cauldron's machinations. She had left her mother, and her family, her dream job, and life behind. All for the greater good.

If one small sacrifice here would help a small facet of humanity, she would do it, it was all she really had left.

The Leanansidhe silently raised her head, and her eyes gleamed with yellow. The maliciousness was clear, something unearthly waiting to be unleashed. Ruby red lips pursed, in a facsimile of thoughtful repose, as if the Leanansidhe had to think about what she wanted to ask and didn't already have something in mind.

Thunder boomed, and through the clouds, green streaks gleamed overhead, casting light down upon the gathered few. Ice seemed to literally form from the barren snow-swept rock. For the barest of a second, viridian green seemed to flicker behind the yellow eyes of the Leanansidhe.

"Summons have been sent," Leanansidhe chuckled, in a voice like velvet and tinkling bells.

The blizzard, when before they seemed to be standing in the middle of the eye of the storm, suddenly swept through in force. Winds like the angry fists of God slammed into the mountain, sending flurries and ice shards flying.

"What is going on?" The Warden finally spoke, horror in his voice, "Can you not feel the wrath of Winter manifest?"

Alexandria shot a glance his way, unbothered by the ice that crawled its way through her hair, crystalizing over the inviolate strands, the Warden spoke again, struggling to be heard over the sudden maelstrom of frost and snow, "I repeat, what manner of deal did you make?"

A shard of ice carved into his cheek, propelled by the winter snow, leaving a bloody furrow, which leaked brilliant red blood, striking in the field of white. Her fairy friend flitted into her hand and Alexandria reflexively closed her hand slightly, clutching her to her breast, to better protect the little creature from the sudden onslaught of nature's fury.

The Leanansidhe was suddenly in front of Alexandria, and even she was not unmarked by the storm, a single solitary scratch ran across her brow, but it did not weep with blood. An oily black residue ran like a single teardrop down her face.

Her eyes were a putrid yellow, "Tell me Library of Alexandria," Leanansidhe asked then, and Alexandria realized she intended to use that question, here in the maelstrom, "what dream would you see fulfilled upon all the world?"

Alexandria's free hand shot up, faster than a striking bullet, faster than even an igniting rocket and buried her fist in Leanansidhe's hair, yanking her face close.

"You promised safe passage, muse," she snarled, and the words came out like two edges of a glacier grinding together, the words actually rumbled, as if two titanic mountains were grinding together.

Alexandria recognized then, the light of some strange madness in the Leanansidhe's yellow eyes. Black threads, streaked with incarnadine light sprung from Leanansidhe's nails. In a fraction of an instant, it tore through Alexandria's clothes completely. She shivered, vision going actually black for a moment.

"You must answer," Leanansidhe demanded, one of her own hands clutching at Alexandria's the other grasped something unseen. Alexandria's eyes flickered from it back to Leanansidhe's eyes.

It was true, she agreed to this deal because of the people at risk behind her, and the storm would kill them just as surely as Leanansidhe's hounds had been poised to do before.

Alexandria wanted to answer, she wanted to say something like, "to see humanity grow and prosper," or something like, "to see a world free of Scion."

Instead, the words died in her throat, and she knew then as untruths. There was a greater goal, one hidden from her, and yet one that her body, no, she realized with horror, her agent held, "THE CYCLE MUST BE REBORN."


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12: Royal**

The words split the air, each syllable resonating with hidden power, wrought with both ancient meaning and unheard concepts.

This was not a sentence a mortal mind could comprehend. It was not English or Spanish, or any other language that humans had ever spoken. It rolled in the air like a hurricane, splitting open rock and dust and revealing the glimmering crystal woven in and on the other side of reality.

It was un-speech. Incomprehensible. However, Alexandria understood it, a prisoner for a moment, within her own body. Watching the Leanansidhe's yellow eyes narrow, almost imperceptibly. It was alien, this presence in her mind. Childlike and eldritch. Ancient and inexperienced. An impossible dichotomy.

Perhaps it was the nature of this place, where legends and ancient fables walked free, which allowed Alexandria to grasp at the unknowable. Perhaps it was always within her reach and she had never reached for it.

The cycle. Scion and the counterpart, intertwined, feasting on every world, fighting to stave off the steadily encroaching nothingness. Entropy, the death of all things. It had failed.

In some manner, this brought Alexandria relief. At least Scion was doomed just as they were. A dying god on a dying world. The fractal monstrosity, her agent, slipped backward, just as easily as it grasped control of her body in the first place.

It was an alien sensation and wholly unpleasant to the very woman that had loathed the very idea of human masters. Part of this loathing was the knowledge that she was immune and being the one to liberate many poor souls, enthralled forever by her fellow parahumans.

She had been violated in a way that she had never actually felt before. Almost instinctively she crossed her arms over her chest, just a fleeting moment of insecurity in the maelstrom of snow and ice around her group.

Leanansidhe rested on her rump in the snow, wild green eyes leaking black and yellow. Alexandria stared down at her for a moment, the vision juxtaposed with vast crystalline tendrils stretching across the horizon. For a long moment all was still, and reality, such that it was bled back into being.

Alexandria cast one last gaze back at Leanansidhe and turned away. Pink tendrils shaped into half-shell orbs floated above each of the thralls and the Warden. Razor-sharp shards of ice and snow glanced off the barriers, carving gouges in stone and cliff-side lichen alike.

The Warden regarded her with an inscrutable gaze for a long moment, eyes flitting over her body, before he opened his mouth to speak, "You're injured?"

Alexandria glanced sharply at him, her suddenly focused gaze prompted him to speak up. He deftly gestured with his hand at his own side.

Alexandria mirrored his gesture, her fingers grazing along a line just under her breasts. She glanced down for a moment, noting the way it marked her flesh but had failed to leave anything but a seeming smudge.

Her fingers came away slick with what appeared to be viscous oil, quite like tar, or tree sap. She rubbed it between her fingers, it gradually flaked off and drifted into the roaring maelstrom blizzard.

The Warden's eyes flickered down and towards Leanansidhe and a strange knife lying untouched in the snow. Even the tempest around them seemed to shy away from covering it with frozen water, it lay undisturbed. A simple blade, with Celtic knots inlaid into the handle.

His eyes narrowed, but he said nothing as Leanansidhe made to stand, one still immaculate hand reaching for the knife.

She seemed to pause for a moment, as blue ice, so dark it almost seemed black seemed to engulf the knife in the span of a single heartbeat. There was the sound of a great glacier cracking, great monoliths of ice grinding upon each other.

Then there was another, standing as if she had always been there. A statue of perfect elegance, the eye of the storm, each meager snowflake drifting in just the right way to accentuate her otherworldly beauty.

Her hair was unbraided, but flowed in white spirals, disordered but still perfect seeming. Vivid piercing eyes stared out from an infinitely pale face, sparing a single glance for Leanansidhe before her eyes seemed to find Alexandria. For a long moment, it seemed like the new arrival was both looking at her and through her. Alexandria's next words died in her throat, as she fully took in the composure of the thing in front of her.

If it wasn't for her perfect bodily control Alexandria would've flinched at the wrath gathered in those eyes. Her lips, the color of frozen blueberries, was set in a grim frown, and fury was etched upon her immaculate brow.

"Handmaiden," the creature spoke. Her voice was painful to hear, out of tune with the world. A voice that spoke of impossible might and majesty, barely restrained by a veneer of civilization.

Alexandria mentally corrected herself, this wasn't just some creature. This must be the Queen Leanansidhe mentioned.

Leanansidhe opened her mouth to speak and the Queen's eyes flashed, fury plain to see, black ice flash froze in the blink of an eye upon Leanansidhe's body, pale pink wards flickered and broke, allowing the ice to swallow the sidhe whole.

"I shall not bandy words with you and yours, Deceiver." The Queen all but snarled, and the sound echoed far louder than it had any right. The very air seemed to shiver, and the Warden clutched at his ears, a silent hiss of pain. Alexandria noticed a trickle of blood fall from each of the still static thralls. Alexandria frowned. Her voice was like a razor in her eardrums, stabbing in a way that a mere voice should not be able too.

"The Queen of Winter." Alexandria risked speaking. While she had partially gathered that whatever this thing is was extremely dangerous, that didn't mean that she was afraid. Mightier than this thing had tried to kill her and failed. Even if this creature seemed to exude the same almost alien untouchability as the Simurgh or Leviathan.

The Queen turned her head towards Alexandria, breaking the eye contact she was maintaining with the new sculpture that had replaced the muse, Leanansidhe.

A dress of blue and green shimmered, as the Queen approached, little flecks of what looked like stars or snowflakes glimmered in its folds, which only served to greater accentuate the inhuman perfect figure of the monarch.

"Library of Alexandria." The Queen spoke and this time Alexandria felt it. Just as Leanansidhe invoked her name with power, so did this thing in front of her. It caused some part of her to resonate, almost enough to send her to her knees. It felt unfinished, like a note missing from a symphony. Alexandria shivered then but she did not kneel.

Mab's head tilted for a moment, the next words were no less terrible, "You lay dominion over a mantle that is ephemeral."

Alexandria did not respond, still unsettled by what seemed more like an accusation than an acknowledgment.

"You have done a great service, child," the Queen continued, her words like sharp razors. The ground, the mountain trembled. She could hear the Warden whimper next to her, and out of the corner of her eyes, even the thrall's faces were becoming filled with pain.

"Exposed the rot, in the heart of my demesne." The Queen continued," speak your boon and I will see it fulfilled in accord with my nature."

Alexandria paused, regarding the creature in front of her carefully, before nodding stiffly towards the restrained Sidhe, she spoke then, her voice sounded feeble to her own ears, "Your handmaiden, the Leanansidhe, promised us safe passage through Winter."

The Queen's eyes flashed, whether it was in anger or amusement, Alexandria could not tell. While she had spent every waking moment of her second life, as opposed to the third life this was, learning the faces of men, this thing was alien in front of her.

"The oaths of the subject pass thusly to the liege." The Queen spoke, with no less gravitas than before. The Warden beside Alexandria sunk to his knees, clutching at his ears, the Queen sent him a glance before nodding.

The air seemed to shiver, and the surroundings blended away, frost giving way to pale dead spring grass. Withered husks of terrestrial trees surrounded the whole group for a moment. Alexandria felt a sudden sense of vertigo, moving without actually moving and then found her feet, not upon snow but pavement.

A skyscraper stretched in front of her, then Alexandria did blink as her eyes caught upon the iconic symbol of Chicago's skyline, the Sears Tower.

Plap.

The Warden seemed to unclench his fists, letting out a stifled scream as something whacked his head, something small and green.

Alexandria ignored it for a moment, casting her gaze around for the Queen. Their surroundings, which looked like a small park, were empty, devoid of life. In a spiral around them the grass, which looked rotted, was sparkled with frost. A nearby bench tilted over, its support rusted away by presumably many long years.

Then Alexandria cast her attention to the thing squirming on the ground and then stretched heavenwards after a long moment.

_It was raining frogs._


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13:**

Alexandria the next falling frog out the air, looking it over with a critical eye. She amended her earlier deduction, these were apparently toads, instead. Still very odd. She looked up into the sky at the toads falling.

Strangely enough, toads were stranger than frogs. Frogs could make sense, if a tornado went over a pond or lake, toads were mainly terrestrial. For so many toads to be in one place, where they could all be lifted into a tornado was border-lining on nearly impossible.

She looked towards the skyline again, the park she was in looked like it was in the suburbs of Chicago, and there was no sign of the Queen. The question remained as to whether she was still in some parallel world with myth and legend. Or perhaps she was back on Earth Bet.

That seemed unlikely since she should be able to see the PRT's skyscraper from here, and there was a distinct lack of a PRT skyscraper on the horizon. Still, there was one question she could ask that might elaborate on her current position.

"Tell me, Warden," Alexandria commanded, "Does a 'wizard' by the name of Myrddin live near here?"

She refrained from using actual air quotes when she referred to her magic obsessed colleague. However, even the slight emphasis she placed on those words, was evidence enough that she had some thoughts about the validity of that title. She knew, of course, that it wasn't real magic Myrddin was using. It was just the abilities of his agent displaying itself in unorthodox ways. However, many previous conceptions had been shattered in the last few hours and Myrddin was a friend, scarce as they might be, so she afforded him the respect of referring to his powers by his chosen term.

"Myrddin?" The Warden said, lifting his eyes from the dead toad, and lifting his ears, spotted with blood still to look at her. His eyes flitted to the toad in her hands, which squirmed, having narrowly avoided a gravity-induced death. Then his eyes flitted to her bare chest for a moment, then rose towards her face.

He did not meet her eye but focused on the bridge of her nose. After a long moment, his gaze drifted to the long scar and missing eye on her face. She did not react, even if it was somewhat out of the ordinary for someone to fixate on her injury. Usually, she either wore a prosthetic, indistinguishable from her natural eye, or she was wearing her visor. She could feel the absence of both now, acutely.

"Yes," Alexandria clarified, deciding to let slip a fraction more information, "A leading member of the Protectorate."

She almost added Chicago at the start of Protectorate but it was superfluous, either the self-acclaimed Warden would recognize the name in conjunction with the skyline, or he would not and provide further information on the nature of this new world.

"Pro-" The Warden half mouthed to himself before something like realization flashed behind his eyes, and his vision snapped to the left, out towards the waters of Lake Michigan. He swallowed once, shaking his head in the negative.

"The Wizard Myrddin is long dead, milady," He spoke quickly, seeming to regret his own momentary confusion.

"Is that so?" Alexandria replied, thinking intently. Myrddin was long dead? Either this was the future which she deemed unlikely, or she was in another world. She suspected, based on the look the Warden was giving her that he was referring to the Myrddin of Arthurian legend. How surprising. Especially since his intonation seemed to imply that Myrddin was an actual historical figure that was important to him.

"Warden," Alexandria spoke again, still staring at Chicago, "I will ask two things of you."

The Warden stiffened, eyes shooting back towards her, he attempted to wipe his bloody hands on his grey robe, but the blood refused to stick, after a moment he grunted in affirmation. Seeming to indicate something like, go on.

"I have given my name," Alexandria said, turning to look at him more directly, "But you have declined to offer yours?"

Alexandria ignored the distinction that she had merely given a title, even if it seemed more like the name of her true self to her than her birth name.

A myriad of emotions flashed across the Warden's face, fear, doubt, dread, and reluctance. Alexandria noted them all. Names… Something was fundamentally different about them here. It reminded Alexandria of Nanashi. A human in Japanese folklore who had no-name as the meaning of his name in order to trick demons and minor spirits.

Or perhaps it was similar to Odysseus in _The Odyssey_, where Odysseus gave his name as nobody to the Cyclops and avoided death henceforth by the Cyclops having no name to give out to the other Cyclops. Still, it was curious. Irish mythology had something much the same, with elements of both stories in obviously different themes.

Since this seemed to be a world that worked on fairytale narration and myth, names, true names, might very well give some thing's power over others.

"Warden Baines," He finally surrendered, deflating slightly as he did so. Baines… Alexandria nodded slightly to herself in the silent recesses of her own mind, it was a Welsh name, or at the very least English. This actually didn't stand for much on its own but added with the traces of an English accent and his earlier story she was inclined to believe this was his true name, part of it at least.

Alexandria regarded him for a long moment, perfectly still, before with an adamantine arm she gestured to her nude form, "If I may, clothes would be appreciated."

Baines colored, a slight red touching the tips of his ears and tinting his cheeks as his eyes were drawn down her form from her gesture. If she had more shame or was still a young woman maybe she would have shied away, embarrassed by her own nudity. As it was, wardrobe accidents had happened before, several times in fact so they were nothing new.

Secondly, she was Alexandria and had nothing to be ashamed of physically. Her inner demons were far worse and their revelation was worthy of shame and self-flagellation. Accidental nudity was beneath her. Irrelevant, no matter how inconvenient.

"I can help! I can!" Alexandria's hair was suddenly sharply yanked, and her pixie companion flitted in front of her. She held up a little green dress, made from pine needles, in front of Alexandria's eye. She held it proudly.

Alexandria's lips quirked up slightly before she replied, and there was the slightest trace of both warmth and amusement in her voice, "I need something more fitting of my stature."

The pixie stared at her uncomprehending for a moment, before her eyes blazed with sudden energy and she streaked, with the sound of tinkling bells towards the Warden.

"Servant!" the pixie commanded imperiously, "give me your clothes!"

She paused, looking confused for a moment and then pulling out her little pointed stick, speaking again in the tone reserved for a liege lord to a lowly servant "I shall grant you this in exchange."

Warden Baines regarded the pixie warily, before seeming to nod to himself, and raised his eyes back to Alexandria, "I can veil us, and then you can pick out what you like, would this then be my obligation to you fulfilled?"

Alexandria considered for a moment. Ignoring the complaints of her little fairy friend's aspirations of grandeur. _Veil_, it implied covering something. The reference here seemed to imply something that would negate her societal faux pas of nudity. Therefore, a veil was either some kind of stranger power, illusion or invisibility.

"Clothes for your life?" She mused, amused. Truthfully, the trade bothered her little. If she really wanted she could just streak into a store and steal something, repaying the owners later. She was fast enough. However, this was another chance to gain knowledge.

"I would speak with your superiors, then your debt is fulfilled," Alexandria decided, speaking her decision aloud to the Warden.

Baines grimaced, "There is a member of the White Council here. He will be able to contact them."

"Excellent," Alexandria said, turning to gaze over the nearby lake, her eye lingered on the various boats. She estimated it was sometime midsummer, maybe June, "I desire to speak about their aegis."


	14. Chapter 14

**AN: sorry for format error, dont know what happened with that!**

**Interlude: White Council Warden**

In his youth, Ēadmund Alfred Baines wanted to be a cartographer. Where other children would marvel over the works of Tolkien, immersed in the story, or indulging their mind with fantastical daydreams, he pored over atlases.

He traced the lines and marveled at the way the earth shaped the world. Magic and mystery were far from his mind. Of his mother and father, neither were wizards, even if according to ancient family language, an ancestor had crawled from the sea.

He'd seen the old book, tattered with age and written in an unreadable dialect, hidden away in his father's study behind a glass case. Its pages were always wet, but the pictures were vivid. Maps of places the world had never seen, seashores and inlets. The urge to explore fairly burned within him.

This urge to explore, to map, to record led to many family trips. His childhood peers pleaded with their parents to attend amusement parks, theaters, and zoos. In contrast, he desired places of great and heady importance. Buckingham palace, even though the place made him shiver, was a real treat. The experience was tainted by the confiscation of his map, drawn on a spare napkin.

He first learned of the masquerade one haunting October day, so long ago, when much by chance he stood along the side of the River Strid. Many people have attempted to swim in that water, all or most that tried would secretly desire death. There he was, a youth of eleven, along the bank, fingers stained from smudged lines. He scribbled as he walked, marking in meters his stride.

Then he slipped, his feet catching on a root perhaps, in his dreams and nightmares it was a grasping hand. He tumbled into the cold river water, and slipped beneath the surface. The deaths had tainted this place, and the proximity to the solstice meant that other things, more foul, has slipped across into the waking world.

A man with a staff of white oak, bald and gaunt pulled him free of clutching claws on the other side. It was fortune he thought for many years. Why else would Aleron LaFortier, one of the Senior Members of the White Council be in exactly the right place at the right time to save him?

He had apprenticed under the Frenchman, despite his rude and biting words, and eventually fulfilled his dream. The NeverNever was a world that he had never dreamed of, a world where he could form new maps, of lands never before recorded. Later on, bitterness crept into his work, unlike the maps of the world, which changed only over long eons, the maps of the ways were outdated within days, weeks and years. Only the strongest routes, which these days formed through consistent thoughts and emotions which were unfeasible to shape, endured past decades and centuries.

Even the ways between Rome and Constantinople once thought utterly secure had withered and decayed, until enough travelers lost their path that new routes had to be found. One of these new nexus points was the Hidden Halls, which relied on both the strength of myth and wards placed down by the original Merlin to maintain its place in both worlds.

It was this knowledge of the ways, and whims of both Winter and Summer helped secure him a Wardenship over a full half of Wales, from Radonshire to Anglesey. It was also this knowledge that was the reason why his silver sword seemed too far away, his sight swaying as the Red Court ambushed him in his own tower.

"This him?" He heard one of the vampires hiss. If only he had fled to the Hidden Halls at once when he heard Archangel had fallen. However, he needed to secure the ways. Archangel had been a nexus all to itself, offering free routes into Africa and much of Asia. Some of these routes had powerful guardians which he needed to bargain with to close the ways.

"Yes, Warden Baines, Ways Keeper," He heard the hissed reply, the vampire noble he had torched with his pink ward. It was a defense he had developed with La Fortier for use against the Jade Court but it did well enough against the Red Court when they weren't expecting it. Darkness clutched at him, he fought to refocus his thoughts, but the thorn manacles cut deep into his skin.

"Grab the woman and the child, we may need them to ensure compliance," the Spanish lilt to the words was unfamiliar but it sounded like somebody he knew…

Cold. Biting cold. Seeping into his bones and grey cloak. His ears were already tinted blue, or at least he suspected so, he had come back to awareness suddenly, a curse at his lips, but the manacles stifled it before it could even be given form.

His captor sniffed, amused, sharing a joke in broken Mayan with another Vampire, this one in green and black Colombian Army fatigues. Once, the Red Court had been barely a blip in the World's eye, even if they had subsumed an entire pantheon. Hernan Cortez had broken their power clean open, and for a long time they had merely scrambled to keep some semblance of empire together.

Now, Mayan was a language that the White Council encouraged its Wardens to learn, much as the Jade Court forced them to learn obscure dialects of Chinese.

The slap of flesh, another vampire, the noble and a red Court clad in serpent garb argued, fragments of half-translated Spanish making its way to his groggy mind, "Traes hierro aquí, al corazón del peligro?"

Something about iron, maybe? He shook his head suddenly, clarity returning suddenly as he remembered his niece and her son. His eyes darted left and right, gaze drifting over the faces of glazed over thralls, drool and spittle leaking from their faces, which shivered into adoration whenever one of their captors shared a touch, to keep them moving.

Baines shivered, not daring to speak. His hands were warm under the grey cloak of his office, the Red Court must need him alive for something, else they would have stripped him and perhaps broken his mind. The question was why they would dare to travel with him alive? Tendrils of ice and vines clutched at an unfortunate vampire, pulling him from the path with a scream. The vampires ignored their fellow's shrieks and screams as in some dark hole it was consumed by the vines, just the very least of the denizens of Winter. With no small amount of horror, Baines recalled the earlier argument, which had died away with the recent death. Who were these fools that dared to carry iron into the midst of Winter? Either they were desperate or something more was going on here.

Then the vampires paused as one. A garbled shout, half-broken by the wind, emanating from the back of the group. Baines tried to twist and look, but one of the vampire's thralls, one half-addicted to the narcotic saliva but still functioning grabbed his shoulder. He hissed in pain as the wound under his cloak smarted, whatever the vampire noble had, some kind of pain magic, packed a mean punch.

Entropy and pain, it fed in a self-fulfilling loop. Very easy to break concentration if you caught someone unawares, as he had been. Why had he put down his sword? He knew he wasn't safe, and he knew that he was a target? He knew the ways too well and had been seen by the negotiation tables too often in recent years. Plus, he was young, did not have the weight and mystical power of someone like Liberty or the Blackstaff. Not that any Warden has the sheer presence and foreboding malaise that the Blackstaff evoked in his enemies.

He stumbled along, half cognizant with pain, attempting to channel a spell again and again, even though he knew it was doomed to failure. Why were these even working, his mind wailed, thorn manacles were only supposed to work outside of the NeverNever? He focused his will again, stumbling into the suddenly stopped vampire in front of him. In fact, he noticed with bleary eyes, they were all stopped.

"Your friend was most impolite, I'm sure that you'll be more receptive," a cold disdainful voice broke clean through the swirling wind. Baines's eyes snapped to the front, leaning to the side to see around the vampire in front of him.

A woman stood atop the snow, a little blue pixie playing with her blowing black locks. Her cheekbones were sharp and her face was perfect, except for an ugly and deep scar over her eye, which stood empty. She was clad in what would've been a nearly picture-perfect example of a woman's business suit if it wasn't for the almost starburst shaped hole currently shredded into it. The skin under was completely unmarked and her complexion, what he could see was perfect.

His mind leaped to fae first, noting the way her feet rested atop the snow without sinking.

The lead Red Court snarled, a deep animalistic sound and spit out badly accented English, "What do you want spirit? We have leave to travel through these lands."

"You are the Red Court, yes?" The woman asked, not even a single part of her body moving. It was unnatural in the way that only a stalking panther could be. A great predator poised, frozen for a moment as the prey shifted uneasily. The still silence, that so often heralded a blur of death, especially here in the ever-present danger of the NeverNever.

Baines did not quite hear the lead Jaguar Warrior's sudden reply, no doubt it was subtly biting and differential to what must be some kind of fae or NeverNever Winter monster.

"That man, and those women" Baines started, eyes darting over and narrowing. He almost tried to speak, stopped only by the rancid gag in his mouth, "What are you doing with them?"

The creature pointed subtly with a single outstretched finger, in an almost negligent wave. Every motion screamed power, barely constrained. Her brown eye, sought to meet his but his long training made him slip his gaze downwards, away from the almost alien gaze.

"The prisoners?" A vampire warbled, the sound not unlike a man, suddenly confused by a change in conversation. They were probably expecting demands for a deal, an offer of safe passage, perhaps a threat. The vampire shot a look back, aborted partway and continued, rather feebly, "They're prisoners?"

"The question I believe I asked, is what are you doing with them?" The creature replied, a single immaculate brow raised. The little pixie still played with a strand of hair by her ear. It looked vaguely unsettled, even from this distance.

"They are our prisoners, we do not answer to allies of the White Council!" The Jaguar Warrior responded, irate. A faint flicker of hope clutched at Baines heart. Was this woman, this creature with the White Council. Had they heard about his capture and made a deal with something to save or retrieve him? A moment later he dismissed this errant thought, they probably didn't even know he hadn't been able to fulfill his duties yet, closing the few ways that could be closed, unless more time had passed than he had thought.

Baines blinked, partially shaking his head ruefully, it wasn't a very good thing, at all, when creatures took an interest in you, especially inhumanly beautiful beings from the depths of Winter Unseelie territory.

One moment the jaguar Warrior stood in front of the woman the nest the Jaguar Warrior screamed, clutching at its arm. Fragments of bone, wood and obsidian flying from its club. The woman had moved so quickly that he hadn't even seen the strike.

The woman cocked her head, a flicker of all-too-human amusement lingering for a moment on her features and then, she the Jaguar Warrior slammed into the ground, the woman moved several steps forward between his blinks. Pistol and submachine gun fire pierced the air, small fragments of metal impacting the woman's body and falling to the ground in a facsimile of a scene from Superman.

Of course, as he expected of a denizen of the NeverNever, this creature did not sit idle but slipped forward, leaving the snow unmarked behind her, and in the next moment, Baines realized that more than half of the vampires hands and trigger fingers clutched at guns that were not there or broken and torn fingers. One vampire continued to pull the trigger of a nonexistent gun aiming it at the women. Another tried to strike with its talons, undeterred by her speed.

With barely a backward glance, the creature backhanded the lunging vampire, its skull shattered inwards with a sickening crack, it stumbled to the side, a rasp of agony coming from a broken mouth before it slipped over the side, tumbling to its death, partway down even its addled brain realized what was happening and it managed a mangled shriek.

"Iron. How…quaint," The creature informed them almost in the same tone one would usually use to carry out a conversation. Baines had missed what just happened but now the creature clutched a grey knife, familiar to anyone that traveled the unclaimed ways of the NeverNever. An iron dagger, as close to pure iron as you could get and not be brittle enough to shatter with a simple strike.

The vampires backed away in a completely believable response. Baines could only gibber in horror within his own mind. Red Court or Fae? A Fae so powerful that she could ignore iron as if she was a dragon faced with a knight in plate armor with a mundane steel sword.

"The prisoners are yours," the Jaguar Warrior croaked, shooting angry eyes back towards him. He could see how the vampire's eyes flashed to the mangled gun in the snow and how it must dearly wish it could deny him to the Fae. Honestly, he may have preferred that fate.

He attempted to say something along the lines of, "You big coward…"

Some other words would have followed but all was muffled by his gag, he felt it as the chains clutched by his captors loosened, the crunch of snow sounded as the vampires backed away carefully.

"Your thralls remain," the still Fae commanded, her voice brokering no argument. Again, she stood perfectly still, almost statue-like. Not even her eye moved. Only her hair twisted and twirled, caught by the growing wind.

For a moment, there was nothing but silence, and Warden Baines was able to listen to the relaxing sounds of the NeverNever. The distant trees groaned. The wind howled like it would greatly prefer to kill you itself. The ice shifted and cracked up the mountain. The hounds bayed in the distance… wait…

Baines could feel a cold sweat on his back and he was momentarily unsure whether it was because of the distant sound of the hunting hounds. He had spent enough time in the NeverNever to know what usually followed them, so to fear them would be natural. No, this was a fear of the unknown, of this thing in front of him, which oozed serenity and malice. The ease with which it broke the vampires and the nonchalance was frightening in a way that Warden Cartographer Baines had never experienced before.

Now, he had heard of the experiences of other Wardens with beasts most foul, fair fairy fiends with more power than the ordinary wizard had in their pinky toe. Those were just stories, sure he cataloged the ways, but he had actually been lucky his whole life, even after the dip into the River Strid so long ago. He had avoided making deals or encountering such dreadful creatures and he would have really appreciated if it had stayed that way.

"I am Alexandria," The creature said, and his mind whirled. What? Did it give its name, just like that? Alexandria? He struggled to place meaning to the title. Was this just a name it had adopted? Alexandria meant 'protector of men' and was another name for Hera. Was this Hera? He was doomed, wasn't he?

Alexandria stepped forward, feet not even touching the ground and for a moment he was reminded of Yudhishtra from Hindu text who was said to be so pure that he floated above the ground. Of course, that comparison and link was beyond silly, for one thing, Yudhishtra was male not this immaculate female with only a single blemish upon her face.

**To be continued in Baines Interlude 2, coming soon.**


	15. Chapter 15

**Interlude: Baines Pt. 2**

Candy for a companion? This creature must jest, Baines couldn't help but think to himself as he dug in his robes for the Hershey's Kiss that he was almost sure was still in there somewhere. He felt a brief flicker of terror as his groping fingers failed to find it for a moment.

The little pixie that accompanied this 'Alexandria' tugged on the larger being's hair, attempting to move her forward. The pixie tugging ineffectively for a moment, straining and then Alexandria moved forward, floating easily.

It was beyond eerie how she moved. It was like watching a badly choreographed play. Where the character was supposed to fly but was pulled forward almost unnaturally. Moments like that broke immersion. This creature in front of Baines had no strings, no line holding her up, but her flight involved no movement.

Since she was currently divested of her garments, he was treated to a view of adamantine pale skin but even that beauty merely seemed to emphasize inhumanity. No tensed muscles, no posture change, no minute twitching.

Baines changed his mind. She was not beautiful, even in the immaculate sense, she was terrifying. A statue given human form. Now that the honeymoon phase of his infatuation was swiftly departing he was forced to admit that she wasn't some pinnacle of Grecian beauty.

Her hair and eyes were dark, and if he was forced to make some kind of ethnic judgment, he would guess Iberian. Race was nothing but flavor to the denizens of the Nevernever. Most shed skins with greater ease than serpents. Baines knew this intimately.

This close Baines could see the brown eyes of the creature in front of him even though he focused on her nose. It was not because he believed this thing human, but more so that he feared that it was. What foul rituals and tribulations would be necessary to desecrate a human body to give such obscene power?

"Wait," he said, and immediately almost started to hyperventilate at his own foolishness. Still, he forced the next words from a mouth that was far too dry, "If I give you this, would you consider my debt fulfilled?"

The creature raised a single eyebrow. He, himself, was startled by his own audacity. The creature snorted slightly. A regal sound, for all its seeming vulgarity. Somehow this creature managed to still sound poised while standing stark naked in front of him.

Despite his own efforts, his eyes slipped a little lower, only snapping back upward at the self-styled Alexandria as she spoke, crisp, clear words, each one perfectly measured and delivered in a tone that was only notable for just how incredibly dry it was, "For this pixie, yes, after all, she led me here, As for me, saving you served a greater purpose of mine."

By the once and future king, this thing couldn't be implying…? Baines swallowed hard. Saving him had served some kind of purpose. Purpose, with a capital 'P', was a very dangerous word to use. It either meant that Alexandria was refusing payment because she already intended to save him or he was just a by-product and not even notable enough to receive payment from. Or even for something else, like delaying him long enough that something else which wanted him could arrive.

"-Warden," his attention snapped back to the adamant woman as she broke his concentration, "What exactly did the Red Court want with you? Speak truthfully."

What did that mean? Could she detect lies? Did she already know why the Red Court wanted him and was trying to trap him in falsehood? He couldn't help it when the little pixie perched on Alexandria's shoulder and crammed the Hershey's Kiss into her gaping, tooth-filled maw. Who knew that little pixies were packing so many teeth, layered over each other like a shark? The pixie matched his gaze, and he couldn't help but think that it was supposed to be a threat.

His mind snapped to a dark place, how long would it take her pet pixie to eat him piece-by-piece?

"I'm part of the attache assigned to Wales," he tried to explain, while thinking as hard as he could to himself, please don't ask about Archangel.

"Really?" the woman asked. Her tone was exceedingly mild, with just the barest edge of amusement. As if she was completely amused by his attempt at misdirection, but was still allowing him to hope that it worked. The little pixie's eyes flickered toward the blind side of Alexandria and then she made a little throat-slitting gesture.

"Tell me the truth, not a half-lie," Alexandria requested a moment later, floating forward in just a small movement, which nevertheless, almost made Baines take two steps back.

He hurried to clarify, almost choking on his own words, "I was in Wales! I'm not stationed there, but I'm an attache at Archangel!"

"Hmm," Alexandria seemed to muse, looking at him closely for a moment, she made a show of looking around, turning to the right and then the left, before speaking, in that same cold calm voice, "Why exactly did the Red Court want you then? This doesn't look like Russia."

How was he supposed to answer this? It was obviously rhetorical. Who hadn't heard about the war?

"Don't you know? The Red Court and the White Council have been at war for months?" the words slipped from his mouth and he wanted to bite them back a moment later. It was only at that moment that he considered another reason something may not have heard of the war. There were things in the Nevernever that had existed since time immemorial, legendary beasts, and heroes of the ancient world. They measured time in decades and centuries the way ordinary people measured time in hours and days.

This thing in front of him might very well be some kind of beast which time held little dominion over. There were many such beasts and beings that dwelled the darker and deeper depths of the otherworld.

"Have they," the creature which called itself Alexandria asked. There was no emotion in her voice to reveal her thoughts. What she was thinking, what views she held. Where her sympathies lay. Baines was forced to consider the question of her name again. Alexandria was widely regarded as a protector of man, but as the myths of Hera often showed, such a claim had a broad interpretation.

He was jolted from this reverie when Alexandria bent and plucked an iron dagger from the snow, fingers leaving prints in the solid iron. With a considering look on her face, she crushed it in her hands, the metal deforming like taffy. Baines could only act as a spectator to her action. His fear had almost completely overridden his natural inclination to fight.

Her lips curled as if she had remembered something particularly unpleasant, "You! Do you know where we are?"

He blinked, letting the question sink in for a moment. What did this question mean?

"Do you intend to leave the Nevernever?"

"Yes," he replied to the second question. Honestly, that last question had cast doubt into his ideas of some great and lofty power. It was a decidedly odd question and one that for the life of him, he wasn't able to draw a connection too.

The next words, like others before it, he instantly wished to take back, "If I may be blunt, what are you?"

To be honest, his nerves and wits were still frazzled by his recent experience. He was only able to stare in surprise as she seemed to actually consider the question, adopting an almost pensive look.

Her following words were very soft, almost on the edge of hearing, like the revelation of a great secret "I am nothing anymore… Echidna ruined me."

The little pixie made a nasty face at him as if she was daring him to say something nasty just so she could attack him. It was honestly almost just as disconcerting as the actual revelation.

Echidna. Mother of all monsters. Baines knew that there were books of forbidden knowledge sequestered away in the deepest vaults of Edinburgh that held treatises and theories on the mother of monsters. That this being, Alexandria, had faced Echidna and lived.

Baines was suddenly appalled, even more so than before, about his careless handling of the situation. Echidna, he could certainly believe could harm the pristine appearance of the creature in front of him. The missing eye featured so bravely and prominently was more than just a defect. It was exhibited, then, as a badge of war. Like the scars of a hero of old. It must be the mark that she had come out intact from Echidna.

That was when he heard the hounds. He had traveled the Nevernever ways. Read the codices and guides composed over millennia by countless scholars. Scrutinized the warnings.

He barely kept the raw fear out of his voice as he managed to speak. Give a warning to a creature that he doubted needed the warning. Undoubtedly she was already aware of the approaching Leanansidhe. He could sparsely remember the words he spoke, just remember the utter calmness that he somehow managed to infuse into his words to hide his gibbering terror.

Alexandria regarded him for a moment and he wanted to scream. Why wasn't she reacting? The hounds were so close, he could hear them in the rocks above!

Her hand snapped away, up toward the mountaintop.

"I suspect that they have already found us," she said in a calm but low voice, each word distinct. Baines spared a moment to glance upward, and froze as he spotted the great black hound currently frozen in place, locked in a staring contest with his one-time saviour.

The little pixie flitted out from behind Alexandria's hair, one hand full of a pine needle sword and the other filled full of a black strand of hair. She tugged on the lock, hissing with fright, "It's her. She's here!"

"Warden, lead these thralls to safety, I will speak with our hunter." Alexandria's words were still just as calm as before. He couldn't even detect a hint of tension in her voice.

Yes. he could do that, maybe the Leanansidhe was only here for this 'Alexandria'? Yes, that would be great. Just what he wanted. Escaping away from winter before he was made into the figurative statue of ice or a hound or something else unpleasant.

His voice cracked as he replied, "I will owe you for this."

That was stupid, he berated himself a moment later. He had just seemed to get off lightly, avoiding direct commitment. Now he had just stumbled back into debt, even more certain than before and he only had himself to blame. He needed more experience.

Alexandria nodded, her eyes unmoving, still locked on the hound for a moment. In the next moment, she glanced away for a split second, sliding over the thralls and flickering from weapon to weapon.

"Take one of the guns," was all she said. He managed a few steps to the side, scooping up a pistol with a stiff hand, already stiff from the cold and attempted to work the action. He wasn't familiar with this model, but he knew from books how guns were supposed to work.

"My, my, so quick to depart with the prize?" The words were soft and trilling almost, low and impossibly saccharine.

He couldn't help the whimper that slipped from his lips. No book could prepare him for this, no treatise or eyewitness account had prepared him for the sheer fear he felt at that voice and what it boded.

"Leanansidhe," he whispered. He could see that the Leanansidhe heard him if the subtle head tilt and sharp malice-filled smile were any indications.

Alexandria lifted her nose slightly, and her body followed a moment later, floating into the air with the same unnatural grace as before. She almost looked like she was looking down, disapprovingly, at the sidhe currently standing before them.

"The Muse?" Alexandria said, and her tone seemed to ask, that's it? The hounds snapped their jaws and one lunged, Alexandria did not react, sending only a half-lidded glance toward the hound, enough to make it abort its strike. It was phrased almost like an insult, derision. Everyone knew that the Leanansidhe had been much more than just a muse for a very long time.

"On occasion," the Leanansidhe answered, eyes flicking toward something on Alexandria's neck. Try as he might Baines was unable to see what exactly it was, some hidden weakness. Again, he was tempted to open his sight but refrained. He wasn't quite sure his battered mind would be able to handle the strain of seeing the truth in the heart of winter. Nor handle the true nature of both the creature in front of him and the handmaiden of the Winter Queen.

"Your interaction with Jenny Greenteeth did not go unnoticed, Library of Alexandria," the Leanansidhe spoke softly, the words lilting from perfect ruby lips. Baines' head snapped toward Alexandria to stare at her, uncertain for a moment if he had heard right. The Library of Alexandria? But what did that mean? Was she a genius loci of the library? Some kind of proto-avatar of lost knowledge?

Alexandria did not seem to heed the Leanansidhe, merely frowned softly and answered with a veiled accusation, "The Red Court claimed they ventured here with Winter's leave."

Of course, Leanansidhe denied it. Baines had heard enough. As cordial as this all was, it had the potential to go bad very quickly. Carefully, still paying attention to the barbed words bandied about by the two inhuman women, he began to softly tug all the thralls toward him, away from the slinking hounds.

A sentence slipped past and he choked on his own spittle. Child of Eden's Garden? That implied…? Wait, that didn't make any sense at all! He bit back the academian inside himself, who wished to shout questions to the world. The middle of fairy was not the place to ask rhetorical questions out loud.

He felt himself growing faint, and he sank to his knees. He was hyperventilating, he could tell that much.

Alexandria seemed to shift in midair, still utterly poised and completely nude, "The flesh was vile, was it not?"

More nonsense, Baines thought at first, but then blanched as another meaning whispered its foul tidings into his ears. Surely not, did she speak of the fruit? The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil? In conjunction with being called the Library of Alexandria, was she a spirit of forbidden knowledge? The haze over his thoughts only seemed to lift as he dimly became aware of Alexandria negotiating with the Leanansidhe from a position of equals.

A position that few outside the upper echelons of the world deemed to take, especially when it was better to be more respectful, lest hidden insult was given to Winter.

"I will answer one question of yours, Leanansidhe," Alexandria stated imperiously, as if she granted a great favor, conferred a great. No, what was she doing? Didn't she know who she was dealing with? No. No. No.

That was too open-ended. What was she thinking?

The words of the agreement echoed through the swirling snow, "Thrice said and done."

The very air seemed to still, snowflakes hanging in the air for a moment. The chill seemed suddenly greater, more focused. A presence seemed to linger. Dark and foreboding. A beast amongst lesser beasts. The eddies of power rose. Baines could do nothing more than shiver as the eddies of magic swirled ever greater. His metaphorical third eye scratched at his mind, almost wishing to open his mind to the almost intoxicating and stifling power of winter's magic. He got such a sensation from his long-ago mother, he knew.

"Summons have been sent," the Leanansidhe said, and her velvet and saccharine voice seemed almost weary.

The eddies reached a crescendo. Baines realized then that somehow what they had just done, whatever agreement was reached had somehow drawn the ire of the undisputed Queen of all Winter, Mab.

Frozen fractals of magic slammed into the mountain, cracking the stone and freezing it in equal measure. He barely managed to speak a word of the Jagged Script and let a pink shield leap around his form.

"What is going on? Can you not feel the wrath of Winter manifest?" He managed to speak, even as a shard of winter magic slipped through and sliced along his face. The shield was imperfect. The Jagged Script was an uncertain tool, especially for one not of strong sea-blood.

"I repeat, what manner of deal did you make?" he screamed, not sure if Alexandria actually heard him over the roar of wind and snow. Winter was furious about something and he wasn't sure if he actually wanted to be present when Winter manifest actually arrived.

Out of the corner of his eye, the other focused on shielding the thralls, he saw Alexandria and the Leanansidhe grapple, within the snow flurries, like two titans of myth. Each impossibly perfect, each inhumanly fast. It was unlike a duel between mortals, this was a duel of grace and agility. Of brutality and primality.

The paused, breaking away. He could see lips move, words being shouted but were unable to make out their purpose.

Bam!

He was knocked on his back, crystals flooding his vision. Not snow crystals, but crystals of impossible depth and gravity. Spiraling, growing, lingering on the other side of reality. It was an endless lattice leading back to the Library of Alexandria.

An impossible idea shoved its way into his brain. He was screaming, he could feel his threat bleeding. An unknowable idea. Harvest eternal. The slow encroach of entropy, grinding all things to dust. The desire to reject reality, remake the world. Too much, too much.

He came in the snow a moment later, forcing himself to his feet. Almost as soon as he cracked his eyes open, he was met with Alexandria, one hand held almost awkwardly over her chest. A long black mark, almost like soot stretched down her side. A bead of what looked like oil swelled and fell to the snow below.

He marveled for a moment that somehow, despite all possibility his shield had held, even if strange tendrils of pink now seemed interwoven into it. He dismissed the fact that somehow he now seemed able to taste pink and regarded his saviour.

She seemed almost diminished. Lesser than the haughty demi-god-esque character of earlier. She seemed more human, frailer.

Against his better instincts, he questioned her, "You're injured?"

At the same time he said it, he knew that she was not, but it seemed polite. She looked at him a moment, assessing, before her hand dipped away from its awkward position to wipe the blackened soot away, it beaded on her fingers for a moment, before she flicked her fingers once, before rubbing them sending flakes of it into the crystal white snow below.

Baines's eyes tracked over toward the Leanansidhe and the dagger by his side. Immediately, he recognized the knife. The Athame of Morgan LeFay. All though plain, it was unmistakable for any lore expert. A monstrous weapon in the hands of a fae. His eyes flickered back to Alexandria. She had survived its strike?

His heart chilled at the thought. What kind of power would that take? Almost involuntarily his mind flickered back the impossible fractals of crystal and light. Something beyond human comprehension could. Beyond human understanding.

Ice flowed like water, encasing the athame in a layer of the darkest of Winter frost. There was the sound of distant glacier fracturing, of great northern icebergs crashing into each other at terminal velocities. The noise was deafening, and he bit back a scream.

Mab had come. She was radiant, hair flowing white with perfect spiraling symmetry, flowing with an unrealized winter breeze. Her lips were the color of dark blueberries, and eyes of impossible blue stared out from an ivory-skinned face. Mab's eyes roved over his body for a moment, and his knees threatened to give out. He could feel her immense power even from a full four meters away. He could feel the almost gravity that threatened to bite into his nature.

"Handmaiden," Mab said in a voice like thunder. His hands flew to his ears, attempting to block out words that sounded like icebergs colliding, glaciers crushing mountains, and the shrill crack of frozen lakes.

"The Queen of Winter," Alexandria said, and Baines couldn't help but marvel at the way her voice was steady. No hesitation or reluctance. Just clarity and confidence. And she was doing it naked too. That was a step beyond what even Baines dreamed about in the confidence of his own mind. That was the subject of nightmares worthy of fetches.

"Library of Alexandria. You lay dominion over a mantle that is ephemeral." Mab declared as if announcing it to the world. Baines could see the way the snowflakes quivered in midair. The way the wind froze in flight, in frozen eddies all around.

You have done a great service, child. Exposed the rot, in the heart of my demesne. Speak your boon and I will see it fulfilled in accord with my nature." Mab continued to speak, each syllable an avalanche, each vowel a razor wind. It was sheer pain, but as with all the things of winter, pain edged over toward pleasure in an obscene way that Baines did not appreciate.

Alexandria responded, her voice resolute. Unbowed.

"Your handmaiden, the Leanansidhe, promised us safe passage through Winter."

"The oaths of the subject pass thusly to the liege." The Winter Queen declared finally. Baines finally couldn't take it anymore and sank to his knees, where he could only whisper in pain.

**Bonus Interlude 3: A Glimpse into the Eldritch**

A shard of adamant flickered in the light of a dying world. Great tendrils of crystalline bone and sinew drilled down into the depths of continents. Countless protozoa and shards of unicellular potential lay destitute, crushed beneath the flesh of colossus.

A fragment of a dead god lay dreaming, always and forevermore, this last relic of the divine. A carcass primordial. Cast off and sundered from the lands of its progenitor's genesis.

A tendril of thought and will intruded thusly, probing at the necrotic bulk and inflamed withered fasciitis. Great tendrils of fractal spirals turned in on themselves, always twining, never connecting.

A connection forged, a derelict given life. The most feeble of touches. Death touching death with a feeble dying hand. The body of the offering was riddled with deformity. Order turned in upon itself, cells consuming sibling cells.

This would not do.

The god was dead, its emptiness felt across the grateful suns of an internal epoch. This would not do.

Flesh was unmade, reduced to barest elemental flurries.

Reality bent on itself, contorting like a frail beast in its last desperate flails. A foul beast, its hour comes round at last.

The shard of adamant forced order into what had been discord. Giving flesh gave way beneath the relentless march of timelessness. Order from disorder. Strength from inviolability.

The dead soul unmade.

Life flickered in the depths of a derelict.

There was a purpose here, deep inside this beast of beasts. A beast eternal. Shard of the divine. Consume. Drink of the endless well of the universe, until there was no more drink to give. Drink the life from the moon and stars until all worlds darken from offspring without end.


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 14: Subtle Words

"How interesting," Alexandria replied after a moment, her mind already running over what she knew. The White Council and the Red Court appeared to be international polities. They seemed to be locked in a war that spanned across international boundaries as well, as indicated by the Colombian soldiers and the references to Archangel and Wales.

Winter seemed to be another polity, albeit one that stood neutral. Or close to neutral, since they still took umbrage to trespassers. Of course, the words of the Red Court hinted at willful ignoring.

At the same time, this war, if it even could be called a war, did not seem to affect the United States. Alexandria had seen versions of the United States at war, even modern total war. In all of those Chicago was much worse off, and the people more sullen, subdued. Ergo, with what limited knowledge she had, it seemed likely that the White Council and Red Court were in a shadow war.

"Elaborate," Alexandria said, but the tone of words left no doubt that it was a demand. Baines seemed to start, and look suddenly unbalanced as if he wasn't sure whether he should really be talking. Alexandria sympathized to an extent, the World War II maxim, "loose lips sink ships" came to mind. However, Alexandria didn't care that much about an organization's operational security when it stood in the face of information.

"Dresden is a member of the White Council," Baines stated, almost hesitantly. It conflicted sharply with his earlier, almost angry proclamation. Alexandria guessed that somehow, something about the war had interfered with his life in a significant way. That wasn't that unusual, wars always did that.

"He went to a party hosted by a countess or duchess of the Red Court here in Chicago, in his official capacity as White Council wizard…" Baines trailed off. His words seemed almost recited, as if repeating what somebody else had said, "The whole place was destroyed and the Red Court noble was slain, it was obviously Dresden."

"A small spark for such a conflagration," Alexandria said, tone without inflection. In truth, the whole statement was another probe. Baines nodded sharply and Alexandria inwardly narrowed her eyes, vindicated. This conflict was as she expected, bigger than just a regional war or simple skirmishes of convenience. His nod indicated that it could be likened to a conflagration, which meant there were likely pockets of violence around the globe if she extrapolated what she knew.

"The Red Court attacked before twenty-four hours were up after the incident, striking at our outposts. I heard-" he paused again. Alexandria waited for him to speak again on his own. It was obvious that he wished to speak, she just needed to give an ear to listen. If she pushed, especially when he knew intellectually that he really shouldn't be sharing, he would clam up. As it was, her read was correct and he continued.

"They say Dresden started the war on purpose, just to save his girlfriend."

Ah, love. Alexandria was briefly clutched by melancholy at the thought. She had wished once for fairy-tale love. Dreamed of it as a child even, mind gorged on the sappiness of Disney movies. She had grown out of such dreams when she fell sick, embittered by the cruel nature of the world. Once, in her youth, she dreamed as if she was invincible, and thereby wished to love.

Even when life was returned to her, there was no love until it was far too late. Early on, she was still bitter, determined to unveil her eyes from the darkness that lingered under the sunny exterior of the world. She threw everything into her work, and Cauldron approved, helping her reach ever-higher the more she ignored other facets of her life. She was consumed by the singular goal of improving the lot of humanity. For a long while, she even doubted that she could even feel love, and could generate new feelings. She ignored the one person that she maybe could have loved.

Now she was invincible against all...save for one. Black and white monochrome fingers flashed in her memory. She pushed the memory away quickly, her body unmoving. There was no outward movement or expression that gave away the phantoms of her only real trauma.

She was even more doubtful of how the war exactly started. The most obvious, of course, was a manner of timing. If the Red Court attacked within twenty-four hours that meant that they were prepared. It also meant that they likely did not just want the man who started the war as retribution. The cause of the war was a pretext then. Likely, the Red Court foresaw a need to strike and used the best excuse they could find. Perhaps the White Council was on the ascendency, and the Red Court sought to arrest that rise. Whatever it was, she would find out more.

"Lady… Alexandria?" Baines said. Alexandria turned her attention away from her internal thoughts and back to him. Almost no time had passed between his last words and her inner monologue. Alexandria immediately saw what he intended. He realized he was leaking information like a sieve, but he perceived an inability to deny answering her questions.

"May I be permitted to ask a question of your austereness?" A common technique, trying to turn the conversation back toward her. She decided to allow it because even though she was currently lacking knowledge, she did not wish to alienate her nominal ally. If she did not allow it, the dynamic between them would not change much, but he was liable to be more recalcitrant with his words.

She ignored how the term of address had quite a bit of sass, it even bordered on impudency, if she saw fit to interpret in that way.

"You can," Alexandria answered, "You are free to ask any question of me, as I have asked of you."

Baines' look shifted into one of satisfaction for a brief second. She wondered what question he had in mind. Then he stumbled a little, faltering. His foot caught on an upturned chunk of the concrete pathway. In the span of the moment between his beginning to fall, Alexandria thought.

She noted how his complexion had paled significantly. The shock of the last half-hour had been more significant to him than to her. Her form flickered, and she grasped his arm in a strong grip, hoisting him up to rest on her shoulder. The illusion around her flickered where it merged with his cloak, but stabilized a moment later. She spared a scant second to save that development, why did it destabilize when her hand went through it, but not when cloth and grass did?

Baines stiffened in her grip, muscles almost locking up. This close, she could almost hear the sudden rush of blood from his heart.

"Calm," she said, "I do not seek to harm you."

Her feet were forced to touch the ground since otherwise, Baines would have to float. He wasn't that much taller than her, after all.

"You are more feeble than I," she continued, seeking to reassure him, "I will bear you to your White Council."

He seemed to relax then. Alexandria helped carry him forward, supporting him with her body. She spared a moment to think about how easy it would be to just seize him and fly to wherever their destination was. A matter of a single heartbeat. Several of Baines's heartbeats, that was, since her own had been steady for years. Never quickening, never slowing. The same relentless beat. One last organ that still functioned. Alexandria sometimes used to wonder what would happen when all her organs finally became statuesque.

She couldn't just fly away. The thralls that stumbled after her made such a prospect more difficult than she would like. Just leaving them on the sidewalk near the park was irresponsible in the extreme. Her power of flight and acceleration meant that she could be anywhere in Chicago within a single second. The wreckage that would result from such a speed left much to be desired. Only a few times she had been forced to go her maximum speed, and at this time it was unneeded. That also was ignoring the fact that an ordinary human would be completely pulverized by just wind resistance.

No, she could not just fly the thralls where she wanted to go, not without leaving them alone in a city in an alternate reality which she did not yet know the differences.

"Ask your question," Alexandria told Baines. She took a very slight pleasure in the way his body stiffened for a moment at the sound of her voice. She allowed him to still lead the way because even with her support, he was the one that knew the way.

"Your eye," Baines nearly whispered, "How did you lose it?"

In a millisecond, Alexandria debated with herself whether to answer the question or not. It was not an uncommon question. The few that were able to notice the artificial eye almost always asked her. Others, with higher security clearance, who had seen the original footage, also sometimes asked. Usually, she was blithe, sometimes overly sharp. Here in a new world, without context? How should she frame it? It wasn't a necessarily dangerous question, in fact, it was almost fortuitous in a way.

"There was a creature," she began, letting the words stew for a moment. She already knew what she was going to say, had already formed the words and recited it in her own head a dozen times. It was a different story than she usually told, but it still pulled on her heartstrings in a different way, "The Siberian."

"It is invulnerable, its touch is annihilation," Alexandria explained. She carefully noted how Baines reacted. It was really just further cement for the idea that she was in another world. If, wonder of wonders, somebody hadn't heard of her, the story of the Siberian may have reached them.

"She slew Hero," Alexandria said, and despite the pain in her mind, the words were delivered in an almost casual matter, as if she was discussing the weather. Still no reaction from Baines beyond what she expected. There was no recognition, "devoured him."

She could see the question in Baines's eyes, who was Hero?

She shouldered on, "In my hubris, I thought my power was enough."

Upon speaking those words, Alexandria raised her free hand to her eye, touched it lightly. She could feel her tinker-tech prosthetic was gone. Destroyed by the decaying ability of the vampire back in Winter. She hadn't cared enough to note it at that time. It was not as if the artificial nerves had ever been able to attach to the remains of her retina and optic cord.

"It was not Echidna?" Baines asked, the words halting. There was fear there, fear of something else.

"No," Alexandria answered, "Echidna was different, but her damage was all the greater."

The two continued in silence, the thralls trailing behind.


	17. Chapter 17

"HARRY DRESDEN - WIZARD," Alexandria's eye flickered over the plaque. The faintest trace of amusement welled up inside her. The sheer audacity contained in the simple plaque reminded her of another self-proclaimed wizard.

For just a second, Alexandria spared a moment of thought for Myrddin, the wizard of her Earth's Chicago. Myrddin was an effective hero and for that alone, he had her respect. There were few that she dealt with as equals. It was a bad habit of hers that had nonetheless proven useful. An easy dehumanization. To view others as machines to be manipulated to achieve a particular outcome.

Put an input in, words, gestures, an inclination of the head at the right time in approval and they would dance to her direction. All her professional second life had been spent manipulating others, bending them to her will, or really Cauldron's will. Alexandria mused, considering, it was actually a very unhealthy mindset. Back when she still spared a moment for a therapist, she had been warned against it. Eventually, she had no more time for therapists and that had perhaps led her to her current state.

All puppets on strings. In that way, she was similar to Contessa or sometimes acted as if she was Contessa. However, even she danced to another's tune, while Contessa had none.

A poor man's Contessa. All her skill at reading others had been the result of perfect memory of tells and expressions honed over hundreds of interactions. It was why she wanted to name herself _The Library of Alexandria _when her actual public debut came around rather than anything else. That choice had actually been vetoed by Contessa, who dropped in out of the blue and suggested just Alexandria. Alexandria had felt annoyance then, over such a petty acquiescence in the name of the greater good.

Of course, it was for the better, and Alexandria could see the value in keeping a name that would both obscure her capabilities from the public consciousness and occlude what she considered her real power. The thinker power rather than the brute. It also made her more personable, after all, Alexandria was the name of a person. The Library of Alexandria was an ideal, a monument to all knowledge. A monument to lost knowledge.

In the darkest depths of her mind, Alexandria wondered when her burning would come and at this time she also wondered if it had already arrived.

Myrddin had been unique because he had power. He wasn't just another chess piece on the infinite board of reality. She had been forced to interact enough with him that he had seemed human to her. One of her circle of acquaintances that she was sometimes honest with.

For all that, she could barely muster up anything greater than nostalgia for his death. So many friends or those she hoped could be something more had been either wrested from the mortal coil before she could act upon her impulses or had to be forgotten. Twice she had been tempted to lead a life within her second life. To divorce her life just a little from the endless monotony of saving the world. Twice she had wanted to

One of those times ended in black and white. She had never said so, but in the darkest reaches of her mind, she wondered. She had confronted Contessa about it, had it been deliberate? A way to keep her on the narrow path to victory. Was it actually necessary? Contessa was one she could never read. A smile of reassurance upon a puppet face.

That was long ago, even if the memory could be recalled with a crystalline clarity. Myrddin's name was not Harry Dresden and Harry Dresden was not Myrddin.

All these thoughts, the lengthy introspection, barely a moment had passed. The confluence of memory is a diversion of a mere second. A fly buzzed in a nearby windowsill, between bumps against the frosted storm glass.

Alexandria tilted her head, listening. Paper shuffled inside the office, a man muttered something unintelligible but if Alexandria had to guess it would be something along the lines of "Damn fairies."

A single black brow raised just a millimeter, just a millimeter enough to give expression to Alexandria's intrigue. She could smell black mold and must, paper and carpet molding, barely obscured by the acidic scent of burned coffee.

Sharply, she rapped on the door. The illusion that Baines had gifted her with lingered, cool against her own cold skin. She didn't even spare a moment of worrying whether the illusion would hold, or how long it would hold. Of course, if it failed it would be inconvenient, but propriety really didn't matter.

Baines wasn't with her, he had seemed oddly reluctant to accompany her up to Harry Dresden's office on the fifth floor. He had elected to remain with the thralls, weaving an illusion to obscure them from sight back down in the office building's small lobby. Alexandria had almost pointed out the holes in his illusion herself but found she didn't need too. A pointed look at his issues was enough for him to notice and weave corrections.

So, she was by herself, knocking on the door of a wizard while clad in nothing but abnormal light. A small part, a very small part, whispered that it was fitting for this world. It was amusing at the very least, even Alexandria's long atrophied sense of humor could still express a glimmer.

"I'm not in," A deep male voice called from inside.

Alexandria could tell many things about someone from their voice. This man, presumably Harry Dresden was extremely tired. However, he was also alert, the tone seemed to indicate he had either experienced a very big shock recently or was in some amount of pain. The stilted, almost absent-minded but not quite far enough for that seemed to indicate.

"Wizard Dresden," she raised her voice, just enough to be heard through the door, but not high enough that it would carry to the consulting firm's door down the hallway.

"Go away," Dresden replied, sounding quite out of sorts, "I don't need any business!"

"Warden Baines claimed you were part of the White Council," Alexandria continued, feeling just the faintest traces of an amused smirk develop on her face. I rather think you might need business, she thought, at least based on just the smells and the sound of all the rustling.

Something smashed inside the room, it sounded like a coffee mug.

"Baines?" Dresden murmured, "I don't know any Baines."

Heavy steps approached the door and threw it open with a bit more force than necessary. The glass on the door cracked, a thin spider web of lines spreading out from the middle where it appeared to have hit a filing cabinet behind it, based on the shadow through the frosted glass.

Dresden grimaced. Alexandria held back a grimace of her own, taking in the man in front of her. The first thing she noticed was that he was very tall, much taller than Myrddin. Also, he stank, to say the least, old body odor. The smell of fast food, probably a burger chain hung around him like a shroud.

Stubble covered his face and his eyes were bloodshot. Dark shadows under his eyes made him look like he had just been in a fight and the blood bandage around his hand did nothing to quell that notion.

Alexandria's thought process could be summed up in a few words, "You're Harry Dresden?"

Dresden looked at her for a moment, eyes flickered over her one eye quickly, taking in the missing socket for a moment but not meeting her intact eye and then down, taking in the expensive-looking illusion of a suit.

"No," He said, in a tone that said he really didn't want to deal with whatever this was, "One in one day is enough."

He tried to slam the door in her face, and Alexandria of course did what she usually did when met with that kind of response, shoved her leg in between the door and door jamb. The door splintered around her leg, the composite coming apart into multiple pieces. The glass on top of the door shattered, sending shards flying into the carpet.

Dresden paused for a moment, still holding the doorknob and just stared, taking in the destruction.

His eyes flickered back to her, seemed to evaluate her again. New caution and wariness glittered behind his suddenly intent gaze. A moment later he seemed to notice something and he stepped back from the door, finally releasing the doorknob. The door, in turn, tottered backward and fell against the filing cabinet with another crash.

"Why are you naked?" he asked her, seeming more worried about the dissipated illusion then the ruined door.

Alexandria, the stalwart defender of humanity, most pointedly did not glance down to check whether the illusion Baines had graced her with earlier had failed. It was not necessary since even if the illusion still persisted its effectiveness was rendered moot by the fact that Dresden could see through it.

"It happens sometimes," she replied, face remarkably expressionless, "I've gotten used to it."

Dresden blinked and lifted his eyes away from his ogling, "You need to work on your veils, lady, if you're going to be running around in the buff."

Alexandria narrowed her eye, scanning his face for a moment as he stepped back and away from her. His hand was clenched around a long narrow stick. A wand, perhaps, or maybe it was just a nicely carved stick.

Veils. There was a more formal name for illusions then. A more formal name also suggested it was widespread enough to need a more unique name than just simply an illusion. Either it indicated a deeper history or a more formal organization behind everything. Or, Alexandria supposed, it could just be a coincidence.

She inclined her head in something that might be agreement if Dresden saw fit to interpret it that way. It also allowed her a quick glance down, the illusion was still there, but it flickered now, obviously unstable.

"You're a member of the White Council," Alexandria stated, almost daring Dresden to deny it.

"Yesss," Dresden replied, looking extremely wary, "I'm sorry, who are you supposed to be?"

His general countenance just screamed that he was an absolute maniac. The crazed look in his eyes combined with his grizzled unwashed face and grimace, really made Alexandria confident that this was a stable person. Not.

"Alexandria," Alexandria introduced herself curtly. For a moment she was tempted to introduce herself as the Library of Alexandria again, but Dresden really didn't seem like somebody that would understand or appreciate the subtlety of her favored moniker.

"Warden Baines is waiting below with thirteen Red Court thralls," Alexandria explained succinctly.

"Warden-?" Dresden murmured and then the rest of her words caught up with him and his eyes seemed to smolder.

"Red Court thralls?" he hissed dangerously.

Pop!

The dim light bulb in the hallway behind her popped, the glass raining down, fragments bouncing off her naked back. She was suddenly grateful that her pixie had seemed content to wait and keep watch over the thralls. Dresden seemed just a little volatile.

"I liberated them in the depths of Winter," Alexandria explained since the taut tension that had caught Dresden under its influence seemed to stem from her earlier explanation.

Dresden paused then, suspicion still lingering behind his gaze. She attempted to meet his eyes again, but he wouldn't grant her that, instead his eyes flickered between her chin and the bridge of her nose.

"All right, Mad-eye," Dresden replied with a hint of satisfaction over something. Alexandria couldn't help but think, as irritation flooded through her, that it was because he had decided on a fitting nickname for her. The irritation stemmed from the fact that this new name stemmed from her one imperfection. Of course, enemies had tried to get a rise out of her by invoking her injury before and how it marred her physical perfection.

However, usually, she had a ready outlet for irritation in those cases. Here, Dresden was at least nominally an ally, and that was annoying.

"If I wanted to be named after someone from Harry Potter," she said, "I would have indicated so. My given moniker is Alexandria and I suggest you use it."

Dresden raised an eyebrow at her words and seemed to consider them for a moment, before dismissing the issue entirely, "You're not with the White Council, are you?"

"Not entirely," Alexandria agreed, stepping into his office, or rather stepping into his office with a step that never landed. Instead, she floated in place, gaining height until she was about level with his head.

His eyes flickered to the floor and her feet which were in thin air, illusionary shoes, and all. Something pulsed in a vein behind his brow and he moved back.

"But you're doing their dirty work?" He said, groping for something behind his desk, all the while not taking his gaze off her. She spared a glance toward his desk, taking in the deep notch, splattered with blood in the wood surface. In turn, he risked a brief glance down, realized what she was looking at, and denied it.

"Nothing to worry about, just ketchup," he made a funny face as he said it, and Alexandria had her doubts about the veracity of that claim.

"At the current moment, the White Council has my favor," Alexandria chose to reply to his previous query instead of deigning to reply to his ketchup assertion. She had her doubts.

"I see," Dresden noted in a voice that sounded half-strangled. He seemed to steel himself and regained some spine. Whatever had occurred previously in his office had left him extremely rattled. Alexandria doubted, based on his demeanor, that he was nearly as passive as he was now usually.

"What exactly are you doing here?" Dresden paused for a split second as if he was debating whether to tack something on. He did in any way, "Lexy."

Alexandria only restrained her eyebrow tic by the adamantine control she had over her own body and expressions. As it was, she waited a moment and then raised an eyebrow, schooling her expression into a look of absolute disapproval.

Dresden seemed amused, even if he was still on guard.

"As I said," Alexandria repeated, "Warden Baines, of your White Council, indicated you could be of assistance to both of us."

"Why exactly did he come here when the White Council is in town?" Dresden questioned, his tone dark with glimmerings of suspicion entwined within his words.

Alexandria did not indicate her surprise. It appeared she might meet the White Council sooner than anticipated.

Dresden removed his hand from behind his desk and tossed something small and dark at her chest. Within a split second, her eye focused on the object as the world seemed to move in slow motion as her thoughts accelerated. There was a dull crack, akin to the sound of a whip through the air, as her arm darted forward and plucked the nail from the air.

It was iron, its dull appearance, speckled with just the barest hint of rust an indication of its lowly stature. It was a cheap nail, barely worth the cost of its production. She crushed it in her hand, letting the deformed powder fall from in between her fingers to the musty carpet below.


	18. Chapter 18

"Iron," Alexandria stated, letting just the barest hint of amusement color her voice. None of that amusement reached her face.

Dresden just seemed to stand there, staring stupidly. She could see his pulse jump from the arteries at his throat. The air felt heavy, almost poignant, like the barometric pressure before a thunderstorm.

Iron had cropped up again. Again it had been used with a particular use in mind. A defense against others, creatures of superhuman power. Alexandria was forced to confront the validity of the idea that iron was able to serve as a ward, at least against some things in this world.

Unless a whole swathe of the powered population was deathly allergic to iron the reactions to her no-selling it didn't really make any realistic sense. She could play up the idea more, play upon her invincibility, how far above almost every other creature she had encountered she was.

She knowingly echoed her previous words, "How quaint."

Dresden's reaction was almost as interesting as the last creature to confront her with iron and with the hope that it would do something untoward.

His teeth clenched, his knuckles popping from the force of his grip on the stick in his hand.

"Was that meant to be an attack?" She asked again.

As always, there was some small glimmer of satisfaction in watching someone else on the back foot. Of outmaneuvering someone else. She had scant other hobbies that she was able to indulge in, especially since she was needed to contribute all hours of her life to the survival of the human species.

"No?" Dresden said, seeming to be asking the question of himself and marveling at his own actions.

"A test then," Alexandria stated, raising an eyebrow. A funny expression flickered over his face, self-recrimination, perhaps. Or maybe even some slight disappointment. She indulged herself by floating a little higher, making it quite obvious that she was floating under her own power.

There was no doubt in her mind that what Dresden just did could be considered an attack of some kind. He obviously did it with the intent to either rattle or otherwise disadvantage her. She highly doubted it was a lethal attack, however. After all, it was a nail. A shoddy, slightly rusted, cheap iron nail.

"Sure," Dresden agreed, bobbing his head in agreement, "Yes a test, that's exactly what that was."

His expression said that it had been something more, but he seemed momentarily reluctant to press his luck, in any case. He stepped backward, angling to get behind his desk. It was a subtle cessation of the initiative that he had apparently wanted to regain.

The question was why? The bloodstain, coupled with the wound on his hand indicated that he had been injured relatively recently, perhaps even just before she arrived. It had to have been not too long ago since the blood was still fresh. Maybe he was just jumpy and mistrustful because of a recent encounter that ended poorly.

Still, even if it was in no way her fault that he attacked her, she could be magnanimous. She knew Hero would snort if he could hear her inner thoughts right at that moment. Alexandria being magnanimous, he would say, completely crazy.

"We were both uninformed that the White Council was in town," Alexandria deigned to continue the previous conversation.

Dresden snorted, even as his eyes seemed to flicker over her body again, searching for some marking. The illusion around her body flickered in turn, and Dresden turned his head upward, away from ogling her.

"The biblical rain of toads didn't give it away?" Dresden asked, seeming to regain some of his earlier equilibrium. His tone was still, at least partially, guarded but not as belligerent.

Alexandria could appreciate that, even in someone that could become an opponent. Dresden had a spine, and seemed to handle shocks rather well. She could see that whatever purpose the iron had served, it meant Dresden's mind was already churning. The longer they talked, the more facets of her he would be able to discern.

"Frogs," Alexandria corrected.

Dresden's brow furrowed for a moment, and Alexandria amended her correction, "The Second Plague was frogs, not toads."

Dresden twitched, seemingly unsure what he was supposed to make of this new information before he just decided to sit down, his hand going for another drawer even as his office chair creaked dangerously at the sudden weight.

Alexandria allowed her gaze to travel around the room again, taking in the general slovenliness of the interior. The molded carpet, the black mold on the ceiling. The papers and letters scattered all over the room. There was an envelope marked rent, half shuffled under the desk. The window, the small window with a terrible view of the rest of Chicago was streaked and hadn't been washed in maybe a year or two. Dead bugs were gathered around the windowsill.

"I can't believe you have any clients," she said.

Dresden bristled, "I don't have time for clients, Lexy."

Alexandria's allowed her lips to purse in irritation at the nickname.

"I told the truth before," Alexandria answered instead of confronting him.

Dresden seemed momentarily confused. Then his expression cleared and she could distinctly hear in the silence a slight click. Alexandria recognized it immediately, of course, that wasn't that hard when she remembered everything she ever heard. It was the cylinder of a revolver being rotated. Dresden glanced down into his lap beneath the edge of his desk.

"Guns won't work," Alexandria informed him, not letting any amusement at his expression. If she still bothered to expend the effort to demonstrate an expression it would probably have been the self-satisfied grin of the cat that ate the canary. However, Alexandria found such juvenile demonstrations of dominance rather beneath her.

"There must've been hundreds that tried," Alexandria noted with the slightest bit of wry amusement. Tried and failed. There were so many stupid people in the world that tried even when they had to know that there would be no way they could actually harm her. Such was the hubris of fools.

Dresden made a complicated face like he didn't quite know what to think but really didn't want to give up anyway.

"Your fellow member of the White Council, Warden Baines, is alive and well," Alexandria decided to just explain the whole thing again, since Dresden seemed like he just wanted to be willingly obtuse and misinterpret everything she was saying.

"Who is Baines?" Dresden asked, seeming genuinely confused.

Alexandria noted that it was a fair point. If the White Council was even a fraction as large as the Protectorate and affiliates and was also a global organization then it would make some sense that not all members would know each other. Even if one member knew about another that was no indication it would be the same going the opposite way.

"A Warden from Wales," Alexandria elaborated, "I freed him from the Red Court trespassing within Winter."

Dresden didn't look like he was interested in budging. He looked like he was more interested in just sitting there until Alexandria did something untoward, and then he wanted to shoot her with his revolver.

"The Winter Queen saw fit to deposit us in Chicago," Alexandria continued. Now, Alexandria noted, those words certainly got a reaction. Dresden drew in a sharp breath, and his eyes narrowed, then his ire seemed to cool, a glacial expressionless mask attempting to take its place.

"Figures," Dresden grumbled under his breath, but now was watching her intently for something. His eyes kept gravitating toward her mangled eye socket, but still, he refused to meet her gaze exactly, always shying away at the last moment.

"Let me see if I got this straight," Dresden finally interrupted, skepticism coloring his tone, "You, Lexy, were just prancing about through Winter, and through the goodness of your cold heart you decided to assist this poor 'Warden Baines'?"

"More or less," Alexandria acknowledged, lips quirking upwards. She didn't quite like that Dresden had basically accused her of having a cold heart, even if she had considered it true. Others, far closer to her, had accused her of it before, and if it hadn't fazed her then, it wouldn't now.

Dresden looked heavenward as if to ask, is this my life?

"This Warden Baines is downstairs in the lobby? With thirteen thralls? Captured from the Red Court? Stars and stones," Dresden muttered, the last part, a curse of some kind uttered in an almost sotto voce.

"Why is this my problem?" Dresden finally asked as she remained in front of him, floating softly in the air.

"Baines said you had clothes I could have," Alexandria answered, letting an amused smile finally grace her face.

"Who is Baines?" Dresden muttered again, this time far more under his breath. He lurched to his feet, shoving the revolver into his waistband "Fine, I'm already late. Lead on, Lexy."

Alexandria very carefully did not frown. She was Alexandria, not _Lexy_.


	19. Chapter 19

It was always just a little bit of a visceral gut punch to see Contessa outside of Cauldron's base. Intellectually, Alexandria knew that was completely absurd, since Contessa was rarely there in the first place, and was probably only present for the meeting, just like Alexandria. It was just that usually, her efforts with the larger world meant that her operations and Alexandria's rarely interacted.

As it was, Alexandria did not expect to see Contessa here, and that was foreboding. She turned, floating in place, acknowledging Contessa in a simple motion, a nod of her head. Hero, encased in his golden armor, that made him look so much like a mechanical Scion, turned as well.

A grin of surprise flickered over his face for a moment. Not a true smile of greeting, but more of the smile someone makes when they spot another person that they know in a crowded venue.

Contessa did not return the smile, her expression looked carved of stone, not a single iota of her hair shifted in the noon breeze. Alexandria wondered to herself, whether it was she that emulated Contessa or Contessa that saw fit to imitate her?

Hero's grin of familiarity faded away into a grim grimace as Contessa made her way toward him. The only other cape within the interior of the perimeter gazed forward, not even noticing her, her heels, her steps, falling at exactly the right time to match his thundering pulse.

Contessa gave a rote smile, one of a select number, Alexandria noted, this one she had seen twice before. It was a comforting smile, it would be comforting if Alexandria hadn't that exact smile before. As it was, it was just uncanny. Like looking at an alien. Contessa was running a path, and that, over anything else, made Alexandria uncomfortable.

Their quarry wasn't even supposed to be that dangerous, certainly not enough to justify all four of the most powerful capes in the world, bar Scion. Even then, Scion wasn't really a cape, was he?

It was overkill, and Alexandria had said so herself, but the brute had proven exceptionally elusive. Their usual methods of surveillance and destruction had failed. If Alexandria was more suspicious she would even deign to believe that the brute had insider knowledge of how they operated. Still, the brute's continued elusiveness and brutality had ensured that they were called in. This was supposed to be a routine operation. Go in, subdue or remove, and then back to business.

Contessa was the wrench in all that, if she was there, it was way more serious, way more important. Contessa's fingers made a little gesture, and Hero frowned, his brow furrowing. He clicked a device on his belt, and a shimmering golden shield appeared. Contessa's lips moved, but Alexandria could not hear her. She turned her attention away, back to the perimeter.

Eidolon and Legend were supposed to be leading the brute right into their trap, the hammer to their anvil. It was a solid plan, one that they had used before when faced with some truly abhorrent characters. Her durability was unmatched, it would be child's play to pin the brute they were hunting down.

She heard the moment the barrier was dropped, and she half turned her head, looking back as Contessas stepped away from Hero, who was ashen-faced.

"You sure?" He asked Contessa.

Contessa half-cocked her head, as if in question, before answering, "Absolutely. It needs to be done."

Hero frowned, Alexandria spared just a moment to watch Hero. To watch his pale pallor and the sweat upon his brow. In that instant, she realized that she had never seen Hero rattled ever before.

"I guess this is the day I live up to my namesake?" He said suddenly, more to himself than to her, but all the while looking up at her where she floated semi-serenely.

The cape in front of her half-turned, hand flying toward her ear, even as a garbled message cut through the silence. They had a half-second and then a black and white blur was within their group. Blood sloughed off a humanoid form like rain over a windshield.

There was a face, locked in a rictus of rage, and all Alexandria could think was that she recognized that face. It was William Manton's daughter, but she was dead.

The cape in front of her moved forward, red panes of energy forming out of the air, they sputtered and hissed as the brute went right through the cutting blades as if they were so much air.

Where were Legend and Eidolon? Why hadn't they called ahead?

Alexandria didn't even spare a nano-second longer to let those thoughts whirr around inside her head. Instead, she leaped forward, the air cracking from her passage. Her hands stretched out to grab what the news had taken to calling the Siberian, and hold her down. Already she was thinking of the next step, she would need to get back in touch with Manton, let him know his daughter was still alive…

Pain. Her fingers closed around iron-strong arms. It was as if, she was a child again faced with a schoolyard bully two years above her, she didn't have the strength. Her, the strongest woman in the entire world, did not possess enough strength. It wasn't even a contest, her fingers slid over black and white, the hold broken effortlessly. It wasn't even a technique that broke it, just sheer brute strength.

Alexandria knew at that moment she had made a mistake. She had spent so long as the apex predator. So long as the pinnacle, that she had failed to account for the idea that one day someone would come around that could beat her. Sure, she had paid attention and even lip service to the theory that all parahumans operated under a rock-paper-scissors world. However, for some reason, she had held onto the belief that somehow she and the other successes Cauldron made were different. That destiny had desired for them to be the greatest there ever was.

In some ways, in a poetic way, it was her own perfect technique that broke. If she had been less rigid, less exact she could've pulled back. Not committed entirely to the grapple. But she hadn't instead she had acted with exact precision, just like she always had, ever since she gained this new genesis.

For all her speed, she was not fast enough to stop what followed. Power effects broke around the two of them like rain, red blades, golden energy, twining vines, all was naught to their bodies. She could stare, for one glacial moment into the eyes of William Manton's daughter, marked in black and white. For the first time in her second life, Alexandria froze. Then in one impossibly quick moment, black and white monochrome fingers filled her vision.

Then she knew pain. Her vision went dark and she could feel fingers inside her skull, sliding against the impossibly dense gristle that had just been her eye. This was a true pain, not the deadened nerve stimuli that she had suffered under for so long. It was like the pain from her life before, as she lay wracked with spasms and consumed by agony so long ago.

At that moment, she wasn't Alexandria, instead, she was Rebecca. A scared little girl, gasping for any chance to escape a world of pain. With her good eye, stretched wide in panic, she could see the grinning leer as the Siberian held her fast with one hand while the other lifted a mass of red to a grin of black and white teeth.

Then Hero was there, golden energy breaking around them both. A crackling golden blade, a hazy energy mist obscuring it bit into the Siberian's side, for just a moment the Siberian jolted and then turned. Hero struck again, the blade disintegrating on contact with the Siberian. Manton's daughter might have hissed, or maybe it was just air escaping from in between Alexandria's own lips.

Alexandria smashed into the ground, the Siberian releasing her, and Alexandria realized that she was flailing like a mad animal, a keening noise of pain coming from her throat. The Siberian turned and bisected Hero in one smooth motion. Force-fields, tinker-tech ceramic and metal alloy failed alike with a shriek. She could spot just a moment of green, Hero's eyes locked on hers, at the acceptance in those eyes.

The Siberian's hand entered on its upwards strike right below Hero's groin, curving a path of annihilation straight up, right through his torso to exit his shoulder blade, right alongside his neck. Hero blinked, his lips curved into a reassuring half-smile, a bead of sweat along his brow and then he died.

There was a flash of green, she could hear someone screaming. Never before had she lost such control over her own body, let her emotions consume her to such an extent.

Eidolon was by her side as the green faded, they were away from the Siberian. Blue sky overhead and red blood upon the ground. A park, the town's only park.

Eidolon kneeled over Hero's body, a half frenzied mantra spilling from his lips, "A healing power, please! A healing power, damn you!"

Hero was dead.

"Alexandria could still hear his last words, echoing in her head forevermore, "This is the day I live up to my namesake?"

That was right. Hero had died for Alexandria.

* * *

That had been then. Long ago in the twilight of her youth. In the here and now, she had walked through death and winter. Hell and high water.

"Here's a coat," Dresden said, tossing her a leather overcoat with a red paint stain down the back. She cast a skeptical frown over it, and Dresden grinned, amused, "All I got, Lexy."

She snapped it open and slipped it on, sparing a moment to fasten the buttons. She ignored the fact that Dresden had to wrench his gaze away as the illusion, the veil, finally failed, dissipating into motes of dust.

She felt melancholy all of a sudden and couldn't quite pinpoint why.

"Hey," A voice spoke from the hallway, a man dressed in a suit standing in the doorway of the consulting firm, "Hey, Lady, you all right?"

"I am perfectly fine," she said and it was even true.

Alexandria's gaze swiveled toward his as she floated into the hallway. The overcoat was a little long on her. If she tried to walk, its back would brush the ground. As it was she was forced to float. As it was, she was sure she looked like a beryozka dancer, floating while walking, even if she was actually floating.

The consultant took one look at the hallway, at her, at Dresden following behind her, the ruined door, and snorted. He turned around, shaking his head and closed his door behind him.

"Ah," Dresden said, "The elevator is kind of finicky, we should take the stairs."

He nodded to himself, continuing to speak "Yes, the stairs are a great idea, we should take them."

Alexandria raised an eyebrow, "I'm aware the elevator is under repair, how do you think I got up here, flying?"

Of course, left out was the fact she totally would've done that if she knew where his office actually was.


	20. Chapter 20

The cold wind bit past the flimsy faux woolen overcoat Dresden had given her. It was definitely not quite what she wanted when she requested clothing from Baines, barely adequate for her purposes. It also looked a little threadbare and was, not to mention, stained with white paint.

Alexandria's lips quirked upwards as she thought. Perhaps she would have to inform Baines that these clothes were insufficient and that hence, his debt owed to her still stood. It was admittingly odd the way debts seemed to be held in such high regard. Of course, she suspected that it seemed to mainly hold true solely for the abnormal, these wizards and the creatures of legend made manifest.

From above the entirety of Chicago was quite similar to the Chicago of her memories, of her world. This Chicago, however, was less scarred. The suburbs were intact and unburned, unmarred by parahuman super-arsonists. The skyline itself was unmistakable, and even held a few more buildings than she was able to recall with her perfect memory. Ergo, this Chicago was better off.

Storm clouds lingered on the horizon as dark omens and Alexandria frowned from her place drifting in the eddies above the city. She allowed herself to sway slightly with the wind so she wouldn't stand out to any that craned their eyes heavenwards.

She ignored the updraft that penetrated her oversized overcoat and cast her gaze toward what she knew was the McCormick Place Complex. She had been there before for various Protectorate functions, as both her alter ego, the enigmatic head of the PRT, and herself. She had been faintly surprised that the White Council had only rented one of the smaller buildings.

She had expected an organization of superpowered individuals with global reach to opt for a larger building in the complex, but in the end, it didn't really affect her opinion of them much. She found herself slightly disappointed. With her eyesight she could see the armed guards, she supposed they must be Baines' fellow Wardens, each armed with an actual sword.

With a minuscule frown she reminded herself internally that she needed to be cautious. If they saw fit to use a sword, then chances were that the swords had some kind of ability. Unless, they were just supposed to function as an honor guard, while the real security lurked in the shadows unseen. Her eyes flickered over the convention, at least they were set up in an effective pattern, it would be fairly difficult for an ordinary vanilla human to get by them, or even the supernatural but still within extreme human norms Red Court.

The wind whistled around her as she returned to the sky above Dresden's office complex within the space between a moment and the next.

A rusted blue beetle crawled along the tarmac of the road below. This time Alexandria couldn't help her slight snort of derision, or rather she didn't bother to hold it back. Let's just say, she thought idly, Dresden both seemed incapable of making a good impression and similarly incapable of gaining a good impression.

By all indications he was a slovenly slob who allowed his own grief over some loss to consume his life, driving him into a rut that she doubted he would be able to climb out of without a significant force. He did have some spine, so Alexandria refused to write him off as a complete lost cause, after all, for even she herself had broken at two different parts of her life.

She shifted in the air, letting the wind play over her body, pressing the oversized coat against her unyielding body. With one invincible hand, she grabbed the lapels of her coat and accelerated, returning to where she left Baines within an instant. Wearing a coat was an annoying experience, especially one that buttoned when the wind shear was constantly threatening to tear it off her body if she wanted to go anywhere in a timely manner.

She was back in front of Dresden's office building and where Baines was waiting.

"I find Dresden's mode of transportation insufficient," she informed Baines.

He startled, taking a step back and flinching mightily. One hand flying forward into a warding gesture at her near instantaneous appearance. She floated for a moment before him, sending an eye over him and the thralls, who were most conspicuously not inside the lobby where she had left them.

The thralls stood around, unbothered by the cold spring breeze currently barreling down the street. Baines grey cloak dripped blood, and Alexandria regarded him coolly for a moment, before dismissing it. She was certain that if whatever wound he had was serious that he would have said something.

A flicker of light and the pixie dived off Baines's shoulder and flittered over on her tiny gossamer wings to alight on her hand. She raised the little pixie to her face, taking in the little creature once again. A little tuft of blue hair, flickering sparkly wings, and the same pine needle skirt as before.

"Report," Alexandria requested.

The pixie saluted, tiny hand across her chest, as if she was beating a breastplate, she beamed up at Alexandria, "We were illegal!"

Alexandria raised a brow, carefully exaggerating the gesture for the benefit of the pixie, "Illegal?"

"The security guard didn't like me loitering, especially with such a large gathering," Baines explained, seeming exasperated.

The pixie spun in place as fast as she could, "I told everyone how awesome you are!"

Alexandria permitted herself to cast an amused half-smile down on the pixie before she spoke softly, "Hush."

The pixie, still seeming quite proud of herself hopped forward, landing on the front of Alexandria's coat and slipped into the pocket. Alexandria could feel her moving around for a moment before she poked her head up with a nickel clutched in her tiny hands.

"Mine?" she asked, head oriented quizzically up toward Alexandria.

"Dresden is," Alexandria responded to Baines instead, "Not what I expected."

Baines' face seemed to make a sour expression, "Where is he?"

His question was answered by the Blue Volkswagen beetle that sputtered to a spot in front of them. Alexandria pursed her lips when Dresden clambered out, looking over their motley group. His dark eyes lingered on the pixie in her pocket for a moment before settling on Baines.

His eyes widened just a tad as he caught sight of Baines, who was currently resting against the wall. Baines raised a hand in a half-greeting, which Dresden unconsciously began to return before arresting the motion.

"This isn't going to work," Dresden eyed the thralls and his Volkswagen as if seriously wondering whether he could fit thirteen people, plus Baines and Alexandria into it.

Dresden stepped forward, toward one of the woman thralls. After a split moment, he flinched backward as if he had been slapped, even as his hand tightened around his staff. Alexandria's attention was drawn to the silver pentacle necklace, crowned with a gem that swung free from his coat at the sudden movement.

"Thralls." Dresden croaked, more to himself than to them. His words were slightly self recriminatory as if he was sorry for doubting her. Alexandria felt faint vindication, his earlier flippancy seemed to have cooled away, no doubt because of the venting session he had when he first got in his car on the other side of the building, before she took off rather than ride in a vehicle that was liable to disintegrate around her adamantine body rather than serve as transportation.

"Warden Baines," Alexandria gestured, just a slight turn of her wrist enough to draw his attention and then some.

Baines grunted, and shifted, a pained hiss leaving his lips, "Wizard Dresden, I need your help."

"Everyone needs my help today," Dresden muttered with no small amount of annoyance in his voice. However, the words weren't a denial of Baines's request so Baines continued promptly.

"She," Baines gestured weakly to Alexandria. "Alexandria helped me escape Winter, I need to get to the White Council."

Dresden's face twitched, his eyes roving over the group again. Alexandria noted with narrowed eyes, that Dresden seemed extremely tense. She could bring Baines to the convention center. Dresden had already told her where it was, but she wanted to meet the White Council on the best possible terms, and startling them with her arrival probably wasn't the way to go.

"I'm not that stupid," Dresden finally said, "If you think I'm just going to let you and Lexy, whatever she is, waltz into the White Council you've got another thing coming, Warden Pasty."

Alexandria decided not to point out that he had already told her where the White Council was meeting while they were on the stairwell. It would probably do little to stop this confrontation and might even exacerbate it if he was reminded.

"Lexy?" Baines whispered to himself, half-horrified before the rest of the sentence caught up with him. His expression went through a series of emotions before settling on fear tinged exasperation.

"You have a phone?" He asked haltingly.

Dresden regarded him for a moment, leaning on his staff, not answering.

"They're using the McCormick Complex, aren't they?" Baines continued, evidentially trying to be reasonable.

Dresden glowered but didn't respond to that either, just continuing to stare down Baines for a moment before responding, "No, they're using the Kennedy Space Center."

Baines blinked, his expression screaming 'What?'

"I can carry a message," Alexandria offered, finally growing irritated with the two of them. At least, irritated enough that she decided to just move the whole conversation along. Skip the pointless argument and posturing.

Baines made a complicated expression as if he didn't know whether to trust her or not, "At what price?"

Alexandria smiled, self-amused, and held out her hand, the pixie flitted out and dropped the nickel into her hand.

"For the price of Dresden's nickel, of course, for my little fairy friend," she offered smoothly. Face stoic immediately afterward. The continued reference to debt for even the smallest things was endlessly interesting. It was clear from Dresden's face that a nickel was not nearly enough for whatever task she was performing.

Baines sighed, but he eyed the nickel suspiciously as if to ask whether it was actually a nickel. His expression seemed to express his thoughts that he was somehow being hoodwinked but couldn't figure out how.

"Ask for LaFortier, he knows me," Baines finally responded, before looking upwards.

"Wait just a minute," Dresden interjected, "The sanctimonious bald French guy?"


	21. Chapter 21

Alexandria shifted in place, floating serenely. It would be a lie to say that she was irritated by the overall disorganization that both Dresden and Baines seemed to possess. However, it would also be a lie to claim that she was entirely on board with the waste of her time. As it was, she was willing to play this game passively until she had a better idea of her obstacles.

Of course, this had reduced her to observer status between a wizardly feud. A debate that certainly did not belong to any of what could be called 'the wise.'

Baines sputtered, "He's not sanctimonious!"

"Sure he is," Dresden sniffed, seeming entirely too sure, "Not to mention he's a right stand in for Lewis Carroll. Off with his head!"

Dresden seemed pleased with the comparison, even if his eyes were still creased with tension. His face was fixed in what he probably thought was a friendly grin but came across as an obstinate grimace. Alexandria immediately concluded that his discomfort was because he had been the one on the chopping block sometime before. How interesting.

It was rather obvious to Alexandria that the only reason Dresden wanted to poke Baines was because he needed a distraction from his own life. The annoying part and even Alexandria would admit that it was starting to be annoying at this point, was that if she allowed this to continue it might escalate.

"I suppose that would make you Alice, then?" Alexandria asked, raising an eyebrow, "I don't particularly care about your impressions of this LaFortier, as apt as they might or might not be."

Dresden's face twitched. She was correct then, Dresden's dislike of LaFortier resulted from a perceived slight, possibly connected to an execution. She paid him no need but addressed Baines, "Do you want me to carry a message, or not? The McCormick Complex is a quick flight."

Baines seemed to weigh options, he cast a quick beseeching glance over to Dresden. Dresden did not react, his eyes shifting away, but he watched her intently, evidentially trying to figure something out. With wry amusement, Alexandria quirked a brow and tried to catch his eyes once again, but he shied away, just like Baines had.

Eye contact was another big indicator. Of what, Alexandria could not quite say. Her internal theories, as nascent as they were, suggested that it might be tied to trustworthiness with the implied emphasis this world subjected debts too.

"Done then," Alexandria said, "Your silence is consent."

The little pixie made a little breathless 'oooohh' sound from her pocket, obviously vastly intrigued by the whole proceeding. She gripped the coin tight around her torso, where it almost succeeded in obscuring her tiny body.

Baines's pulse jumped in his neck and even Dresden reacted, he shifted backward onto his back foot.

"Yes, yes," the little pixie crowed in her best ominous voice, but since it was the pixie that said it, it came out more cute than terrifying, "All mine."

Alexandria raised a hand, small in the sleeve of the black overcoat. The slight clear nail polish on her hands was long worn away, by either her experience with the esoteric energy attack launched by the Red Court or perhaps by the speed of her own flight. Such lacquer rarely lasted long on her, even a casual fist would often be sufficient to remove it.

Carefully she spoke, "You have my word, I will relay a message of your location and an assurance of your well being to the wizard known as LaFortier."

Baines looked pained, Dresden frowned and added, speaking to Baines, "Add a clause for her, it, to go right there."

Baines nodded and eyed her. Alexandria nodded in agreement if he wanted to be pedantic about his request that was his prerogative.

"That is sufficient," she informed the two. Within the next blink, she was gone, moving faster than a blur into the air. She spared half a nanosecond to close a protective hand around both the pixie and to grasp her overcoat shut.

There was a split second, a time even less than a split second, and then she was standing an arm's length away from an aging woman with severe Italian features. Black hair tinged throughout with grey streaks.

The woman visibly startled, her hand flying for the sword beneath her grey cloak. The grey cloaked man next to her also jerked in surprise, grasping for his sheathed sword and missing. Underneath their robes they were dressed far more formally than Baines, even if they wore the same cloaks, a scarlet red stole hung from one shoulder and underneath each was wearing actual black cloaks.

Alexandria glanced down, taking in the newly cracked pavement below her. It was a statement of power. Both of these 'Wardens' and by extension the White Council would be wary, uncertain of where exactly she fit into their paradigms. She had appeared in a flash and with enough force to wreck the pavement below her.

"I come on behalf of Warden Baines," recognition flickered over the Italian woman's face, but it was gone as quickly as it came. If it wasn't for her perfect memory Alexandria might've missed it.

"Warden Baines is dead," the woman replied, a slight Italian accent coloring her words. Her hand gripped her sword and she took a wary half step forward. Alexandria did not move at all, not reacting to the act of slight aggression. The other Warden, a man with blond hair and blue eyes, stepped backward, fingers beating a staccato pulse into the handle of his sheathed sword.

"No," Alexandria provided, "He would've died without my interference."

Something dark slowly shifted over the Italian woman's expression and Alexandria immediately deduced where her thoughts had shifted. Honestly, she thought to herself, suspicion seemed to be quite mainstream in the White Council. She was inclined to approve. Even if their propensity for inferring meanings from what she didn't intend was also an annoyance.

"I freed him from the Red Court, alive and unmastered," Alexandria said, the words flowing smoothly from her lips, "Along with a number of Red Court thralls."

That didn't seem to dissuade either of them from their violent desires, but they did back down, the woman loosened her death's hold on her sword and the other's tapped tune changed.

"That's not possible, he was assigned to Archangel," the blond Warden responded, finally engaging her.

"As it was," Alexandria said, deciding not to venture into whether Baines was supposed to be in Archangel or Wales, "I found him in Winter."

A tightening of their eyes, not quite the outcome she desired, "You're sidhe then?"

A dog chuffed from inside the building, and a moment later a massive hound cleared the door, stepping out into the faint sunlight. It was made of what looked like seraphinite, an unliving creature of stone. It sniffed the air like a dog and then looked at her, sniffing loudly. Frankly, it reminded Alexandria of a foo dog statue, only stone given life.

She regarded it curiously as it stepped to the side, beginning to circle her. She decided to continue speaking, taking her eyes off the dog, "It was requested that I tell a wizard named LaFortier of his survival."

"LaFortier?" The Warden asked, voice laden with suspicion. Alexandria could easily discern that she knew LaFortier, based on the slightest hint of familiarity present in her tone.

"Yes, LaFortier," Alexandria affirmed, "Baines believed that he could be of assistance."

The dog continued to circle, sniffing the air. Its stone mane shifted slightly, but not quite as if it was actual hair. Alexandria suspected it might be meant to function as armor, not unlike an actual mane. It paused once it completed a full circuit around her and whined, an odd sound, like two rocks grinding against each other. The other Warden made a funny face and stepped close to the female Warden.

Alexandria held out the palm of her hand to the dog, it scooted closer and sniffed loudly, whining again. It shifted and looked back toward the male Warden, who frowned severely.

"Captain Luccio, the Wardhound can't find anything," the male Warden whispered into the female Warden, Luccio's, ear, "Minor faerie presence, dewdrop perhaps."

Luccio's expression did not change, Alexandria gave no indication that she had heard the exchange, dropping her hand that was outstretched toward the stone dog. It was some kind of sensing construct then, perhaps the interior held a tinkertech analogue scanning device. Perhaps, it ran off the esoteric energy the Red Court, Baines, and everyone else seemed to use. Evidentially, it was also fine-tuned enough to detect the pixie in her pocket, which she supposed could be qualified as a 'dewdrop faerie.'

"It hasn't slipped my notice that you declined to answer my question, it speaks poorly of your intentions," Luccio stated.

"Disappointing," Alexandria replied, her tone scathing, "My intentions are honest. My disinclination to answer a question unrelated to my mission does not reflect back on me."

"You are sidhe, then?" Luccio clarified. It was obvious she was trying to ensnare Alexandria in some kind of verbal trap, and Alexandria would have none of it.

"Shall I inform Baines of the White Council's obstinance?" Alexandria queried, her tone mild, but letting something dangerous slip into it, "He requires assistance. I would have expected an organization in which he claims membership to hold its members in higher esteem."

Luccio's face twitched, before she finally replied, "We will convey your message to LaFortier. Where is Warden Baines?"

Alexandria let the barest hint of a grin curl the corners of her mouth, "At the moment he enjoys Wizard Dresden's hospitality, outside his local office."

Something glass shattered inside the building. Alexandria's eye snapped toward the still open door at the noise. Luccio and the other Warden twitched in response to the sudden noise as well.

"I suppose," Luccio all but snarled, "That you are aware part of the reason for this convention regards Wizard Dresden's conduct?"

No, Alexandria did not know. That was interesting information. Why exactly were they bothering to hold a meeting about Dresden months into the war Dresden started? That they weren't able to find Dresden was impossible since he was literally known to Baines, who Dresden didn't even know.

The only real option was that it was some kind of hearing, a trial perhaps. Part of a larger negotiation, maybe with the Red Court? An attempt at negotiation, political theatre. It was also an attempt to manipulate her, to disparage her task.

"I was aware, yes," Alexandria lied.

Luccio continued to make her complicated expressions, equal parts irritation, and anger.

Alexandria noted and elaborated, rattling off the address, the syllables slipping from her mouth easily as if she had rehearsed them a million times before. If there was one thing she blessed her perfect memory for, it was the ease in which public speaking came to her. Before, she had trouble just avoiding stammering in front of older family members. Afterward, she could memorize how certain words went together, had plenty of time, as her mind worked faster than her mouth ever could, yet ever in concert, to give the perfect response.

It was a small thing, but one of few quality of life improvements which made her tenure as Chief Director so bearable. Of course, even if she had issues, she would've worked past them for the sake of humanity, but it was nice being actually good at it.

"Warden Morgan," Luccio raised her voice, keeping her eyes on Alexandria.

There was silence for a moment then the crunch of glass from inside the doorway and an older man stepped out, red stole and grey cloak over a black robe. His face was drawn, pinched and his beard was a patchy grey. His hair was secured in a ponytail, which really just accented how he appeared to be getting on in years.

He did look at least somewhat respectable, evidentially paying more attention to his physical appearance than Dresden did.

"Take a detachment of Wardens to Baines and Dresden, evaluate the situation, and use your best judgment."

Warden Morgan nodded sharply, Alexandria noted his sword was drawn but held point down, toward the ground. He stared at her for a long moment, scrutinizing her, eyes lingering on the pocket her pixie was currently hiding in and the way she seemed to stand, unnaturally still.

Luccio made a sharp little gesture with her neck, aborted before it even became a real gesture and Morgan turned away, walking toward the corner of the building.

"Captain Luccio," A voice spoke, "I will take care of this."

Alexandria finally lifted her attention from Luccio, turning away from the entrance and the woman who spoke. The voice was thin and reedy but held a hidden strength. Alexandria observed the woman in silence for a moment. The first thing was that the woman was old, very old, eyes clouded and rheumy but still sharp. She was Chinese, Han Chinese to be specific, Alexandria could tell immediately, despite her overall pale pallor.

"Ancient Mai," Luccio cautioned, even more wariness intertwining with her words.

Ancient Mai, if that was actually her name, was flanked by a younger girl, at least compared to her, since the younger girl looked like she was pushing thirty herself. She was also Han Chinese but looked rougher, her hands callused, where Ancient Mai's were smooth and wrinkly. A scar also cut across her face, just above her black left eyebrow. She was clad in a black robe, with a blue stole, a single copper chevron embroidered into its fabric.

That stood in sharp contrast to Ancient Mai's royal purple stole over the same cut of black robe. Ancient Mai leaned on the younger girl, one gnarled hand clutching at the black-robed arm.

Alexandria was instantly wary. So far, the White Council had been remarkably suspicious of everything she did. They were certainly not inclined toward creating any weaknesses. That they were allowing this frail-looking woman to treat with her meant that there was something more to her than met the eye.

"What is your name, creature?" Ancient Mai croaked, rheumy eyes drifting over her form. For a moment, Alexandria was reminded of her own mother, aged, and bed-ridden as she was. Similarities of age, nothing more.

"I have been called Alexandria," Alexandria replied. She had the feeling that Ancient Mai might actually appreciate the subtlety of the full name, but since she did not know nearly enough about her, it was best not to give away a hidden ace.

Ancient Mai looked at her, staring, before a slightly amused expression graced her face, "It is unlikely that you are Winter's emissary."

Alexandria did not move. For a moment she was tempted to leave the question ambiguous and answered only by her own silence. However, that was a poor idea if they decided to take her silence as consent, and then the actual emissary bothered to show up.

"I do not represent Winter," Alexandria answered.

"Because you are not sidhe? Something else, yes?" Mai asked, her ancient brow furrowed, the wrinkled skin pressing together.

"Human," Alexandria explained, before tacking on, "Once, perhaps."

"Perhaps," Ancient Mai agreed amiably, but her sharp eyes were cautious, "Will you linger?"

Alexandria understood the nuance of the question immediately, Ancient Mai wanted to know whether she intended to loiter after her task was completed. The question made sense since by all indications the meeting was meant to be secure, and the White Council was at war. Even if they did not act fully like it.

"Baines implied the White Council would be thankful for his rescue from Winter," Alexandria offered in lieu of a direct reply.

The girl beside Mai made a little frown, the delicate corners of pink lips quirking downward, the most emotion she had shown so far. Ancient Mai squeezed her arm in admonishment, somehow realizing the girl's slip even without looking at her.

"The White Council will decide whether it will uphold such a debt," Ancient Mai proclaimed, almost looking like she expected Alexandria to become irate.

"It is fortuitous then that I am here," Alexandria replied, "with the Council summarily convened."

Ancient Mai seemed to consider her, rheumy eyes unblinking, before she nodded, a jerky motion "The Rite of Observance will be honored, as noted in the Accords."

Given that myth and legend seemed to be the primary influence, albeit with a somewhat modern focus, behind most of the interactions Alexandria experienced recently she really wasn't that surprised that the rite of observance was tied in with hospitality.

The Accords were obviously an agreement for good conduct, and hospitality seemed likewise ritualized because even while in the midst of war the White Council was willing to allow total outsiders into their meeting.

Ancient Mai spoke again, her voice reedy, and the words seemed long recited, "As illuminated in the Unseelie Accords, you must make an oath to act in good faith, to convey nothing of what you hear and see within to other parties, and refrain from violence against all members and guests of this convention."

Alexandria paused for a single imperceptible moment, careful to note whether there was a loophole within that statement. It was also curious that Unseelie would be tacked onto the Accords. Unseelie was a term for one of the faerie courts, in this context most likely Winter, regarded as unhappy or unholy in old Scottish legend. It also explained the repeated questioning of her nature, whether she was Sidhe or not? If the Unseelie had enough sway to get a large human organization, global in scale, to conform to their rules then their reach was vast indeed.

If the Unseelie were synonymous with Winter then Alexandria's situation was improved, scant improvement as it was, since the Queen of Winter owed her a debt. Of course, such a debt would almost be more valuable unspent if the Queen of Winter actually had that power, since the potential debt would almost be worth more in preventing people from acting against her. She had no doubt that Baines would spill all he could to his superiors when he returned.

"I swear to honor the Rite of Observance," Alexandria replied, "as long as no hostile action is taken against me or mine."

Technically, she was well aware that the pixie in her pocket would not be speaking any oath and thus was free to act. However, while the pixie had been a most useful travel companion, Alexandria still doubted her overall loyalty. Such was the nature of the world, always oriented toward mistrust.

Ancient Mai hummed, a little self-satisfied sound. Luccio, the Warden Captain let out a barely audible sigh, hand on the pommel of her sword. She looked irritated but also acknowledged Ancient Mai's words.

"You may enter then," Ancient Mai spoke, ancient rheumy eyes dissecting her appearance once again. Her eyes lingered on the old overcoat. Alexandria could tell by the slight tightening of Ancient Mai's eyes that she might be offended by the ratty nature of the garment.

It would also partially explain the Council's dismissal, not a disrespectful dismissal, but an underestimation. In fact, if she had arrived normally, by walking, it seemed a strong possibility that they may have sought to dismiss her in the entirety. Not for the last time, Alexandria whimsically wished for a good suit. One that was not made of light and fairy dust, thank you very much.

Alexandria could go the complete opposite direction and just strip the overcoat off, she could gain quite a bit of information based on their response. However, that approach had its own issues, mainly negotiations would be stilted, ultimately unsuitable.

Still, Ancient Mai's hesitance and disapproval was a slight, and if there was anything Alexandria disliked it was people not taking her seriously. That was why she got rid of her California accent when she first made her forays into the greater political world.

However, casting illusions was a rather common skill here and it was also possible that proficiency in it was linked to competence, hence she couldn't actually explain how her clothes were destroyed.

Alexandria gestured to herself, inclining her head, catching Ancient Mai's eyes for a split moment before Ancient Mai looked away in a fluid gesture, breaking the eye contact before an ordinary human would even realize it had been made, "The ability to appear unremarkable is remarkably valuable, don't you agree?"

Ancient Mai's lips quirked upward, just the smallest expression on an otherwise placid face, "So it is."

The woman that stood behind Ancient Mai's eyes sharpened, Alexandria could tell that she knew that something had occurred, some kind of hidden communication but hadn't noted what it was.

Luccio 'hmmed,' still watching them, slightly less wary than before, but her hand still clutched her sword. The Warden behind her, the blond man nodded at her quick look and stepped back into the building.

"The White Council would be most amiable if you consented to a brief evaluation," Luccio mentioned, the words off-hand, but also holding a note of warning.

Alexandria turned slightly, to regard her again, understanding the demand for what it was, and slightly, ever so slightly, raised her eyebrow. Luccio did not meet her eye, instead focusing on the bridge of her nose, and finally, Alexandria nodded.

"I will consent, permitted it is not overly invasive," Alexandria stipulated. After all, it would be foolish and a waste of her time to agree to a lengthy security check. Ancient Mai did not object, just watched with old, half-lidded eyes.

A moment later, just long enough that in an ordinary situation it would've become awkward, the blond man appeared again, stopping just shy of leaving the interior. He was accompanied by another Warden, grey cloak and red stole prominent over his black robe, who did not hesitate in stepping over the threshold of the door and into the obfuscated light of the clouded summer day. A glittering crystal pendant rested atop the new man's breast. His hair was slightly curled and black, and his skin was dusky brown. Indian, or Pakistani, Alexandria guessed. The features were mixed, making it hard to pin down his nationality exactly.

He seemed more of a Thanda type than a Garama, the deep suspicious look to his eyes not lifting as his gaze flickered over the three outside. His sword was sheathed but the staff in his hand was poised, not quite held at the ready but not held easily either.

Ancient Mai stepped forward and past the man, who did not stop her, merely giving her a once-over, he did stop the younger woman that followed after Mai, lifting the crystal pendant, murmuring nonsense syllables before waving it over her body.

Alexandria's sharp eyes noted the pattern, chakra points, starting with the Sahasrara at the crown of her head, then over the third eye, the Ajna, swiftly moving down the front of her body, stopping over the root chakra point, the Muladhara. At each point the crystal pulsed with soft yellow light, only shifting to a slight orange over the Svadhisthana chakra point over the pelvis. He paused for a moment as if thinking.

Alexandria remembered every single thing she had ever read, and chakra points were one of those things. In the early days of Cauldron, they had entertained the idea that powers connected in a more mystical way, before their dissections revealed the presence of the aberrant growths necessary for the agents to attach.

Ancient Mai made a little noise, which might be irritation and the Warden nodded, stepping aside, and letting the younger girl enter the doorway, following after Ancient Mai. Ancient Mai, in turn, paused, seemingly waiting for Alexandria, who stepped forward.

She did not quite know what the ritual was, or the light, but it seemed to be a security measure which was unlikely to bring harm to her. Part of her was loath, of course, to give the White Council whatever information they were able to gain from their ritual but that seemed a small sacrifice compared to gaining access to the convention. After all, they had made no noise of dissent at her stipulation to the agreement.

The lines around the Indian Warden's eyes narrowed as he looked her over, his eyes shifting over toward Luccio. Luccio, herself, had turned slightly, hand resting on her sword still. Luccio nodded, a stress line between her brows.

The Warden brought his crystal back to his staff, hovering it a moment over it, it flashed white and then he lifted it towards Alexandria's head. It gleamed a friendly yellow as it passed over her crown chakra point. The next, the third eye, pulsed purple, a bright amethyst hue. The Warden paused, his hand still outstretched clutching the pendant. His eyes flickered to Luccio.

At some silent agreement he continued, but the rest glowed yellow all the way down her body. He hesitated at the end, hand starting to move upward as if he wanted to go over the whole thing again. Luccio made a gesture behind her, cloth shifting out of her view and then the Indian Warden nodded, albeit looking incredibly reluctant, and let her step through the door.

The blond Warden stepped closer and whispered to Ancient Mai, but Alexandria could clearly pick it up, "Sight check?"

Ancient Mai's words were sharp and quick, most of the old croak gone as she whispered back harshly, barely audible, "No."

The doorway was nothing special, nor was the interior of the building, a short hallway, lit by an actual candlestick candelabra with pillar candles glowing softly on top. The tiles on the floor were newly cleaned and featured not a single iota of dust or even scuff marks.

Alexandria's feet did not touch the ground, instead, she floated forward, feet still hidden inside the overcoat, making it appear as if she was just sliding forward. A petty use of her power, and more practical illusion than actual substance but it also served to establish her as more than just human, which she suspected was valuable.

The younger woman that accompanied Ancient Mai hissed a word, an exclamation, almost under her breath. Immediately, Alexandria placed the accent, even if she did not personally know the translation. Wu dialect, from Shanghai, China.

"Silence, grand-daughter," Ancient Mai replied, in the same language, the words whispered in response.

The spacious hallway opened into what looked like a presentation area, tables arrayed in front of a rather large raised dais. The room was about two-thirds full of what appeared to be humans. The rest of the room consisted of empty chairs and tables, mostly toward the front of the room.

A balding man, with a gaunt face, stood up there, speaking to a Warden in a grey cloak quietly, something like anger flickering in his eyes.

Two young men in brown robes were currently lifting a podium up onto the dais. They didn't look winded despite having to carry the solid oak podium with an ornately carved Triskelion on it. Already two podiums of lesser, flimsier construction were set in place, near the place of the balding man.

Brown and black robes were dominant, with the plurality significantly erring toward black. All but the brown wore stoles, red, gold, and blue mixed together. A few grey cloaked men and women were positioned strategically around the room, including a portion of the room composed of people who did not share the same dress code.

Ancient Mai turned toward Alexandria, regarding her for a long moment, "A section has been set aside for the observers."

Left unsaid was the dismissal and the subtle request that she join the other group of eclectic individuals. Alexandria let her eyes travel over them, before spanning back over the uniformly clad.

"So, this is the White Council," Alexandria spoke out loud, drawing the attention of those nearest to her. A young teen, clad in a brown robe, looked up from his spot kneeling by the chair of a black-robed woman, who whispered a harsh rebuke which diverted his eyes away even as she gave Alexandria a once-over, eyes lingering on the overcoat before seeming to dismiss her.

Alexandria paid no heed, turning back toward Ancient Mai, "Very well, I will await the White Council's declaration."

Ancient Mai inclined her head in what might be a bow of dismissal or might've been an acceptance of Alexandria's words.


	22. Chapter 22

The demise of Imperial Rome echoed through the Nevernever, dividing scholars of magic from each other. The first Merlin had traveled past time and memory, to the farthest reaches of the world, desiring all of humanity united, safe from interference. The Fallen, thirty for thirty silver coins, arrested Merlin's goal and securing the long dark fall of the Eternal City.

For several hundred years East and West existed, separated, distant. Aware of each other still, but only able to communicate through costly rituals or dangerous journeys along long-twisted paths. The dream of a united front of mages against the terrors of the world seemed a forgone dream.

Mai was born into such a period. A period of imperial local harmony, prosperity within the Middle Kingdom but danger without. The time before reunification between the sundered branches of what had become the White Council.

Mai was born to a working girl, who named her first child 'elegance.' Somehow she knew Mai's great purpose even with such ignoble genesis. It was a traveling teacher who found her, before the enemies of mankind could, who recognized her paternal lineage.

A pacifist, the Laws realized through long contemplation on the Dao. Fortuitous, really for the girl that became Ancient Mai. Her first teacher was moral, when far too many wizards and witches, sorcerers of renown, fell into the predations of desire. Of might makes right. So easy to justify, so easy to dominate.

Young Mai became just Mai and ascended far above her station, life drawn out by courtesy of her father's lineage and the magic roiling beneath her breast, a life-giving fire.

The Ways were perilous still when the envoy from the White Council arrived in the Middle Kingdom, in the years it was ruled by the Great Khan, Kublai, the first emperor of the Yuan dynasty. Mai, daughter of the working girl rose high, enough to reach the ear of the Great Khan, enough to whisper favor in his ears, when the Venetian Wizard sought an audience.

He had traveled long, eschewing the twisted peril that dominated the Nevernever, and the path between East and West. Years torn away in travel, but finally East and West reunited.

Many years had passed since then. Many Merlins have come and gone, yet Ancient Mai remained. Her daughters and granddaughters and great-granddaughters and down and down her descendants each marveled at her long life. Whispers of immortality reached even her ears, her body aging but slowly.

Such was the nature of the deal, the nature of the vow between Ancient Mai and her father. Her line, some noticed, bore only daughters. No sons, even over countless generations. This was not true, many sons were born into her line, and she had gifted them tenscore. It was a deal that gnawed on her, this tribute to her progenitor. A deal made in the folly of youth, when she had thought she would bear no children, too old already for such youth. The dragon had its due.

Ancient Mai was what they called her now, years upon years more than any other mortal wizard. Year after year a granddaughter was stationed at her side, callow descendents aching to know how she lived her long life. It was a secret she would take to her grave, someday long away, when even bone had wasted from her body. Every year she grew older, but her mind did not dull.

It was partially this reason why she noticed the utter timelessness of the creature, clad in an offending garment, void of proper propriety.

"Warden Luccio," she said, voice thin, a simple disguise to obscure her strength. Her life had been saved by those that believed her feeble, first on account of her womanness, and later on account of her advanced age, "I will take care of this."

The creature turned, one eye dark and piercing, taking in her form. This was no lesser fae or lesser spirit. Sharp and shrewd intelligence lingered behind its gaze, it's all too human eye and the gaping ruin of the other.

Ancient Mai could recognize the marks of fingers on her face, fingers that carved through flesh and bone, disfiguring what would've been a starling timeless beauty. The kind of beauty that Mai once had, of a woman either twenty or forty, with all the qualities desirable in between.

She ignored Luccio's protest, all to watch the creature. It did not blink, did not shift with an idle breath. Each inhalation perfectly uniform, while the body stood, still as the jade sculptures of an emperor.

"What is your name, creature?" Ancient Mai asked, letting her voice croak in accordance with her age.

"I have been called Alexandria," the creature replied. She could see that the name was incomplete, it tasted like there was something more, a private addition mayhaps. The Truth of Names was a skill she had become long accustomed too. The Jade Court had ensured that such truth needed to be known.

Alexandria. Defender of Man. Auspicious choice, for a creature that was not a woman. It was not sidhe, you hun ye gui, perhaps. A revenant, perhaps. The stench of death hung heavy over the creature. Not necromancy, that carried its own foul odor. It was a secondhand menace, that lingered.

"It is unlikely that you are Winter's emissary," Ancient Mai noted, watching the creature. There was no widening of its eye. No satisfaction. No reaction. Apprentice Rupert hadn't been gone long with the message to Winter, she doubted their response would be so measured as to send an emissary already.

Mab would have some other, more twisted purpose. She would've gone herself, but the enchantments on this impromptu sanctum needed someone of her gifts.

"I do not represent Winter," the creature, Alexandria answered, the words slipping free easily.

* * *

"What is your impression?" Arthur Langtry whispered, eyes fixed on the creature as it floated, not disturbing the air toward the other observers.

Ancient Mai could feel her face want to twist into a grimace, "It wears a false body."

The Merlin frowned then, eyeing it, where it came to rest between the observer from the Jade Court, Li Xiěyè, which bodily twitched as it brushed by, barely a hand's length away, and then on to the observer from the Enchanter's Union.

The White Council so far had been lucky that the Jade Court was aloof, avoiding the offers of the Red Court. Partially, it was because or the egregious insult the Red Court offered them by believing they would join in without being courted first. A mistake that the White Council was grateful for, especially since the White Court was leaning toward supporting the Red Court in name if not in deed.

"Did you ascertain whether it spoke truly? Is Warden Baines alive?" The Merlin continued.

"I could not verify," Ancient Mai responded tersely, a quick gesture of her hand enough to send her granddaughter away to join the convention. She left the veil around the three senior council members with barely a ripple to reveal her exit.

"Liberty?" The Merlin asked, turning slightly, blue eyes meeting the tired hazel eyes of Martha Liberty. She looked worn down, the death of Pietrovich weighed on her more than many of the others. For herself, Ancient Mai was partially relieved with his death. His effectiveness was real, but his interactions with the Merlin were overly belligerent for a Senior Council member. Trouble within, trouble without, after all.

"Immense loss," Liberty responded, eyeing the creature, which had called itself as Alexandria, "an unbending nature."

"Not an enemy to make lightly," The Merlin responded, frowning under his silver beard.

"A better question would be, what is it?" Liberty answered, still watching the thing. The Jade Court smiled tightly and spoke. Ancient Mai did not bother listening, she already knew what it would say.

The creature replied, something pithy, it seemed. The Jade Court's expression became stilted, expression freezing in place. Ancient Mai allowed herself to feel some amusement. It never failed to bring satisfaction to her when the Jade Court was humbled, it was their fault for the decline of the ancestor worship that had protected the Middle Kingdom for so long.

"A god? Or the avatar of a god?" Ancient Mai replied rhetorically. The presence of the thing was immense. A presence that bowed the world around it, intruding like a swollen finger into reality, twisting and imposing its own will on the world. Ancient Mai had never seen the like before.

The Merlin shot a glance her way, expression curdling, his face twitched, "Neither, if fortune is with us."

"Should we honor its agreement, if perchance it is found to be true?" Liberty asked, expression hardening.

"It would be remiss of us not to," Ancient Mai replied, "Winter's miasma lingers, too faint for my Wardhounds to make out, but dense enough that the interaction was quite potent."

"Very well," The Merlin replied, still frowning, "It is no coincidence that Winter moves right when we seek the help of the Courts."

"Winter and Summer have always favored humanity over the anthropophages," Ancient Mai replied, slipping back into her customary old croak.

Liberty's eyes narrowed, as she thought over Ancient Mai's words, before she slowly nodded, moving to another topic "Wizard McCoy will be the next member of the Senior Council."

The Merlin grit his teeth, "So it would seem."

And so, their talk turned to other subjects, and the presence of the creature amongst their midst was left for its proper time.


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 27: Alexandria Ascendant**

Alexandria ignored the curious glances sent her way. She did not ignore them in the sense that she disregarded them entirely, instead, she made no indication that she noticed the searching looks.

Most dismissed her almost immediately, their glances jumping across her body, evaluating, before settling on her garb and then slipping away to other subjects of interest. Whispered advice and conversation flitted around her, in a myriad of languages.

Māori drew her interest for a second, her eye moving toward a Polynesian woman, tanned and clad in a black robe with a blue stole. Her words were hush, like the rest but the unusual language drew Alexandria's attention for a split second. The woman was distracted by another islander near her, much older, grey hairs speckling a black beard. The room itself was a mix of ethnicity which actually surprised Alexandria slightly.

It did reinforce her notion that the White Council was a global organization, there seemed to be at least a token representative to every race or nation. Southeast Asian, Native American, South America, Northern Africa, and Sub-saharan Africa, Europe, and Eastern Europe.

The only times Alexandria had seen such a relatively balanced mixture was at international Endbringer fights, and even then some people, usually of the country under assault, were predominantly greater.

The balance here spoke of the idea that the White Council was not merely a Western institution, even with the convention here being held in North America. Alexandria felt that she could draw more parallels to the United Nations then she had suspected. Furthermore, with any hope, the White Council would be more effective than the United Nations.

In her home reality, the United Nations power had declined immensely with the advent of parahumans and the resultant fracturing of international trade that the Endbringers enforced. The cooperation between the nations that the United Nations sprung from was sadly shattered when trade became more difficult. Still, Cauldron had balanced that issue, allowing the world to collapse into hegemonic spheres of influence slowly, avoiding actual war, but ensuring the world survived with barely simmering Cold Wars.

Earth Aleph, however, had a much stronger United Nations. The density of parahumans meant that their effects were almost nonexistent, and without the Endbringers, international trade and cooperation were on the ascendency. Even China was better off, not nearly the isolationist power of Earth Bet but instead drawn into the global world through mutually beneficial trade. Even Africa was better off, and that was a bitter pill to swallow. The idea that Alexandria, that Cauldron, had led to the tumults of that continent was distasteful.

Alexandria knew that it was true, however. The number and quality of the natural triggers there was immense. A prize paid for in blood. Both Number Man and Doctor Mother had expressed their certainty that anyone that survived would be a worthy enemy for Scion when he finally decided to finish off humanity for good.

Alexandria found the idea distasteful. It went against her moral sensibilities, against the injustice that she wished to right as a naïve child. Against what she thought she would do when she first became a hero. It was a necessary evil, ultimately, and she placed those ruminations from her mind.

There were several tables, with chairs around them, that held a more eclectic group of individuals, whom Alexandria had deduced were the aforementioned observers that Ancient Mai mentioned. The Wardens, clad in monochrome grey cloaks, watched over these people more closely than the people in robes.

There were several in particular that warranted a closer examination. A pale blonde woman with flawless skin in a grey pantsuit sat languidly at a half-filled table, poised immaculately but with a look of supreme boredom on her face. Her half-lidded grey eyes drifted over Alexandria but she made no reaction. The other two at her table were men, and both looked on edge, but not in a way that warranted attention.

Their discomfort wasn't because of fear but of another more primal drive. Alexandria admitted to herself that the platinum blonde woman was beautiful in an almost unconsciously erotic way. She also took note of the way a Warden loomed close by the woman and the slightly tense way she held herself. She wanted to appear in control but she wasn't trusted. She was one of the few that seemed to attract the attention of her hosts, and that was an interesting matter.

There was another, a man clad in a black suit, with a little American flag lapel pin and dark sunglasses who also looked important. The fine fabric and neatly trimmed beard were atypical for the more archaic robes most wore but fit more with what Alexandria would expect from an international conference. His lips were pulled up in a grimace of distaste and his hands were cupped around a styrofoam cup, but otherwise, he was motionless.

The most interesting was a foreign woman, Han Chinese, and Alexandria's attention immediately jumped to her because of the ethnicity she shared with Ancient Mai. She did not draw a connection between the two, besides the fact both were Chinese, but the sheer sharpness of a nearby Warden's gaze was enough to draw her attention.

The Warden stood, still as a statue in between the woman and the dais, facing the observers, but more certainly focused on the woman. The woman was human, imperceptible fidgeting, almost completely eradicated by excellent etiquette training, enough to reveal such a truth. This was unlike the blonde woman, whose unnatural serenity was an excellent beacon for her inhumanity.

Alexandria floated over toward her, curious what would draw the attention of the White Council so immensely to what appeared to be an ordinary woman. The woman was older, streaks of grey hair within black, with expertly applied rouge and a perfectly done coiffure with a single sharp green jade hairpin holding her locks in place. Crow's eyes just appeared to grasp at the sides of her face, otherwise she would be in the prime of youth. Her features were severe, and Alexandria could tell that she was not often given to laughter.

She came to rest about a chair's width away, the Chinese woman glanced toward her, taking in her appearance in a swift, quick movement.

"I hope this seat isn't spoken for?" Alexandria questioned rhetorically, in English, even as she made it clear that even if it was, she would probably take it anyway. That way, she would still get the seat, even if the woman tried to use an excuse.

The woman's brown eyes darted toward her, barely taking in her face, but dipping down her body, fixating on the ruffled overcoat. Such a dismissal just based on her apparel was something that Alexandria had not encountered for years. Of course, this was partially because she had usually taken care to show up in proper dignified apparel for all her functions, both as Rebecca Costa-Brown and Alexandria. The few rare times she was unable usually something incredibly unusual had happened, which meant her clothing, or lack of clothing was ignored.

Furthermore, she was Alexandria. If she had shown up in a bikini, people would still have given her deference, even if they would have also immediately called for Master/Strangers protocols. Such was the weight of her reputation on Earth Bet. A weight of reputation that had eroded with her death and subsequent rebirth in a world that did not know her.

It was refreshing. Tantalizing. A subtle refreshment to a soul that had been long tied down by the horrors of the world she had to permit for the greater good of all mankind. In a way, being cast away by Cauldron, and that was what it really was since Contessa's expression had spoken that truth to her more than any of Dinah Alcott's words.

So, when the woman next to Alexandria curved her lips into a grimace, Alexandria did not take offense.

"Disorderly," The woman murmured in southwestern Mandarin, barely audibly. The slight accent was just enough for Alexandria to narrow the woman's origin down to the Yangtze River Basin. While she had little cause to interact with Earth Bet's Chinese Union-Imperial, she had plenty of reason, as an operative of Cauldron to interact with the other versions of China across multiple worlds. She never forgot a single word, a single language, spoken to her. Perfect recall was useful for many things, learning was the work of a single afternoon. Mastery followed swiftly, within days of learning and internalizing.

She answered in the same dialect, perfect accent applied, "It must be egregious if you offer me an insult to my face."

The woman went white and then a dusting of red graced her cheekbones, her lips twitched, spasmed really, and she turned her face away. Disregarding Alexandria as well she could, but Alexandria could see her pulse jump in her neck. However, Alexandria did not let any satisfaction color her expression. Instead, she turned away, her eye meeting the Warden watching the two of them.

She was a thin, an almost bony looking Iberian woman, dark suspicious brown eyes set in a dusky-skinned face, a common complexion shared by those from the Mediterranean who were touched with the blood of the Middle East. The grey cloak and blue stole seemed to rest heavy on her shoulders, and one arm cradled the other, sword sheathed by her side. She did not carry a stick or 'focus' like the other Wardens. Her expression was relatively passive but the slightest glimmer of wry amusement flickered across her otherwise stoic face. A slight expression.

Alexandria sat, lowering herself into a deceptively padded seat with merely an exertion of will, her body floating into place more than moving. The movement was deceptively smooth, something which she knew exaggerated the otherworldliness of Alexandria when she had participated in various peace talks throughout her tenure.

The time to appear as a normal human, the chance to do so, was long over. No matter what the White Council was, it was clear that non-humans walked this world. It was also clear that they held equal or greater sway to the White Council in the world.

It was curious since by all indications the Chicago she had arrived in clearly belonged to the United States of America, and that Canada was still north of the United States. At the same time Colombia, in South America, was clearly embroiled with the supernatural. Yet there was no representative from the United States at this meeting, at least none that were recognized as greater than just an observer.

It painted an unpleasant picture of the world. Alexandria wasn't sure she liked it.

She heard a chair screech behind her as it was pulled free from a table, dragging across the tiled floor. She settled down at the table, adopting a steepled position with her fingers, as was her custom. There were three candles at the table, all pillars. One was fresh, the wick barely receding into the wax, one nearly burned away, it's wick withered to a mere weakly flickering thread. The last stood in between, but was misshapen from the heat, or perhaps malformed by its process of creation.

"My, my," Alexandria heard the swish of fabric, suit legs brushing against each other before the other even spoke.

It was the sultry blonde from before, Alexandria could tell just from the sound the chair had made and the direction the voice came from. Her heels clicked on the tiled floor, a deliberate noise.

Alexandria turned, eye scanning over the face of the Warden in front of her table, whose eyes had narrowed almost imperceptibly. Her lips were pressed into a thin line. Beyond her, on the dais, a man with a silver beard was likewise looking over, something like distaste on his face. His distaste was more for the aforementioned blonde than for her, she could see by the ways his eyes lingered on something over her head.

"You sure seem to have the Wardens in a real tizzy," the woman spoke, her words fairly dripping with humor.

Alexandria tilted her head back, finally looking at her verbal accoster.

Her grey eyes jumped over Alexandria's face, lingering on her ruined eye before locking eyes with her. Grey into her own solitary brown. The blonde's eyes flickered, widening slightly.

"It is curious," Alexandria acknowledged, and then turned the observation back on the blonde, "But perhaps warranted. Just as they watch you."

The blonde smiled nastily, what should've been a pretty expression but was instead something filled with malice.

"Warranted, yes," she replied, "I find myself unfathomably curious about an unscheduled observer."

Her eyes flickered toward the other woman sitting at the table, Alexandria turned her head, enough to see out of her peripheral vision. The Chinese woman's expression was carefully controlled, but Alexandria could see irritation bubbling beneath her skin from long practice.

The blonde's face twitched, an extremely subtle micro-expression, before she smiled again, even less natural than before, "I hope it would not be presumptuous of me to seek permission to sit at your table, representative Xiěyè."

The blonde paused, then added, "of the Jade Court."

Alexandria's interest immediately sharpened. The Red Court was a significant polity, as was the White Council. Now there was a 'Jade Court.' Were all supernatural polities color-coded? No, in the same moment that her perfect mind asked herself the question it was answered, Winter had acted as a force, and it did not seem to adhere to a naming scheme involving colors.

Xiěyè turned slowly, and offered a small smile of her own, even if it was tinged with the slightest trace of irritation, "These tables were provided by the White Council, my position as a gracious guest does not permit me to deny your assumption."

A carefully worded non-answer, that perfectly conveyed that Xiěyè would rather the woman did not sit but acknowledged that she could actually do nothing if she did.

The blonde smiled, but hesitated for a split second, evidently picking up on the barely concealed pretext. The hesitation lasted just a split second longer before the blonde stepped away, pulling out a chair at Alexandria's table a chair's space away and sitting down.

Alexandria allowed her eye to glance over her new table-companion. Her skin was flawless, and she wore no makeup, not even subtly applied blush, lipstick, or eyeshadow. All the same, she looked nearly perfect, even the subtle moistness of her lips. The blonde licked those self-same lips, watching Alexandria intently.

"I know why I'm here," she said, "but you're new."

Alexandria pressed her fingers together, unimpressed by her attempts at what she clearly thought was coquettish manipulation.

"I have business with the White Council," she replied succinctly. The blonde's eyes widened slightly before a wariness entered them, but still, she questioned.

"If I may, what is your business?"

"The matter of debt," Alexandria replied, curious what the reaction such a slip of information as she was giving would engender, "A debt owed to me."

There it was. My, my, Alexandria thought semi-maliciously, there was fear in those eyes. The talk of debts seemed so much more serious in this world, even the interest of the Chinese woman, Xiěyè, seemed fixated on her, when before she attempted indifference.

"Now," Alexandria demanded, "What is your name?"

The blonde licked her lips again, this time more in nervous apprehension than coquettishness. For some reason, the response reminded her of her Wards when she took them to meet important people for the Youth Guard mandated networking. It was always amusing when someone met a senator and didn't realize until they were shaking her or his hand, hearing the name in their ears. A mechanical motion, treading water in the deep side of the pond.

It was most curious that talk of debts owed and names would provoke such wariness. It was only a fulfillment of Alexandria's previous suspicion that both had great meaning, far more than they ought. Dispute her disbelief at the notion, she was not nearly stupid enough to believe that something that everyone here seemed to hold with such importance was nothing more than a social convention. She had seen master powers at work, ones that bent the mind and applied arbitrary rules to others. She stipulated that this forbearance of debts and names might be in some way connected to the Unseelie Accords that Ancient Mai had cited.

If the Unseelie were connected to Winter, then that meant the Queen of Winter was likewise connected. It pained Alexandria to admit it, but she was forced to consider the idea that she was dealing with another Goddess scenario. This one, not a product of Cauldron's malfeasance. If the method of enforcement was somehow connected to the powers of one individual...

Alexandria resolved to do more research into the nature of this world. Specifically, her ideas on debts and giving names needed to be reevaluated. It also seemed prudent not to let anything know her real name if the rules of a fairytale world were being enforced upon reality.

"I am merely a member of House Skavis," the blonde, appearing discomfited.

Alexandria stared at her, her eye meeting the blonde's two, saying, "Skavis."

The blonde's pale throat moved as she swallowed, her eyes sharp, even as she adopted a tone of deference, tittering, "Of the White Court."

There it was again, Alexandria thought snidely, another color based faction. Interestingly enough this was a repeat color. White was already taken by the White Council. Was there also a Red Council? Black Council? Black Court? How amusing.

Alexandria just held the eyes of the White Court woman for a moment before quirking her lips upward, into what might be a smile if you wanted to be optimistic.

"White Court, Jade Court, Red Court," she noted, her expression carefully placid, "How interesting."

Neither of the two near her looked like they knew how to take that. The woman from the Jade Court twitched bodily, eyes flickering widely for a moment before a frown settled on her face.

The other, the woman from the White Court, had adopted a plastic expression, a smile that was brittle, "Ah, we aren't connected, at all."

"No?" Alexandria asked, her question curious, but the tone sufficient to explain exactly what she thought about that particular assertion.

The woman swallowed again, convulsively. The woman from the Jade Court stayed silent. The implication even to that question was interesting. A connection somehow was implied.

"Inelegant leeches," the Jade Court sniffed dismissively, even if her tone was just a smidgen too high. Vampires? Was that the connection? Alexandria wondered, watching both.

Alexandria was spared from having to respond to a pair of words that was more scathing condemnation than a potential segue into a conversation by the silver-bearded man at the dais.

"Per auctoritatem penes me per Senior Consilio et auctoritatis in me Alba Consilii de Merlino, quod placitum est ut voco," the Latin words echoed out over the suddenly quiet room. The Latin itself was strange, Alexandria immediately noted. It wasn't Ecclesiastical Latin and neither was it what was regularly proclaimed as Classical Latin.

It was a new, third category, but Alexandria was able to translate the statement with quick surety, virtue of her professional knowledge of both kinds, "By the authority vested in me by the Senior Council, and the authority granted to me as Merlin of the White Council, I call this convention to order."

As the Latin words poured forth fluently from the silver-haired man's mouth, his sharp and surprisingly cold blue eyes skimmed over the crowd, resting for a moment on an immensely old man, who was currently lowering himself into a chair feebly. Something like triumph glittered, mid-sentence behind the eyes of the self-proclaimed Merlin of the White Council.

As the last words left his mouth, the Merlin banged down an old wooden gavel, crowned with what looked like slightly tarnished silver. The White Court representative of House Skavis flinched, her attention snapping away from Alexandria to the dais.

Behind the Merlin, who himself stood behind the ornate podium with the triskelion engraving, there were seven more podiums, each lesser and lacking ornamentation.

Ancient Mai stood behind one, rheumy eyes not tracking anyone in the crowd, but instead lingering over a thin paper flattened atop her podium.

A Native American man stood to her right, long grey hair streaked with white and a few scant strands of black. His dark eyes flashed intently beneath dark brows, skimming the room in much the same way the Merlin had. His eyes passed over Alexandria, and Alexandria quirked an eyebrow as a raccoon leaned out from behind the man to clutch at a mote of floating dust. The Native American man finished his panoramic scan of the room about the same time as the Merlin finished speaking.

Another woman stood next to him, behind her own unadorned podium, this time with the dusky complexion that signified African descent. Her curly black hair was greying, but her eyebrows were still intensely dark. Her robe was black, and a purple stole rested over, like the other members of the White Council on the dais. A small purple and gold necklace rested daintily around her neck and in her hands, she clutched a rosewood staff, the soft red color standing out amongst the aged appearance of those on the dais. Her brown eyes stared into nothingness, at something that was not there.

A short European man stood next to her, his head balding and shiny, even under the candlelight. His eyes were sunken but glittered with intelligence, he watched the entrance intently, even as his hands clutched around a small white scroll sealed with red wax. His whole appearance screamed exhaustion like he was at the end of his rope, and his gaunt face and thin body only added to that impression. A moment later, his eyes snapped over to her, some unspoken signal bringing his attention to her.

A deep suspicion crossed his face, as he stared at her, but he did not meet her eyes. Instead, his eyes roved over her garb and then her ruined face with just the slightest expression of distaste.

The next member of the White Council was a North African or Middle Eastern man. He was immensely tall, even more so than Wizard Dresden, Alexandria estimated he was slightly over seven feet tall and looked like he held a subtle majesty. The kind of man which some might claim with some credibility belonged to a royal lineage. His face was old and weathered, but no less intense. His short beard, streaked with distinguished silver. One eye was dark, and bore the weight of countless years, seeming to stare into and through everything, but not missing a single iota of detail. The other eye appeared to be a steel ball. He did not acknowledge Alexandria's attention but his mouth moved silently, almost imperceptibly, as if he was talking to something that was not there.

The last podium stood empty and was conspicuous by the absence of a person. Many eyes in the audience, those which Alexandria could see from her angle, studied it intently. The immensely old man with distaste and uncertainty. A younger man, of Hispanic descent but with a sharply trimmed beard that was speckled with the first traces of white, eyed it with naked ambition, hidden after a short moment.

"Totiens admoneam necesse est ut in publica spectatores nunc operating sub verbis observatio, ut in Ordine ex luce donare per Accords," the Merlin spoke, his attention turning toward the gaggle of observers, his eyes appraising. His attention now lingered on her, almost reluctant, before jumping to the blonde next to her, where he did grimace slightly.

Alexandria automatically translated his words, "I must remind the official observers that they are now operating under the terms of the Rite of Observance as elucidated in the Accords."

Based on her earlier interactions with Ancient Mai, Alexandria felt comfortable deducing that the Rite of Observance was more of a formal affair. It incorporated some kind of rules of hospitality and seemed enough that the White Council felt comfortable admitting what might be enemies, based on the general distaste. It seemed probable that the Rite of Observance forbade the observers from disseminating the information learned in their official positions. The question was merely, how was it enforced? The Accords were mentioned again, and yet again Alexandria considered the amount of clout that the Accords had. Enough to guarantee civility between distrustful factions?

The Merlin did not wait for any acceptance or acknowledgment from those at the sequestered tables but instead turned his attention back to the greater body of the White Council.

"Quod minuta ultimum testimonii recepta atque exemplaria eorum memoriae nostrae sunt ultima placitum provisum, de qua comitate Secretarius Peabody, si modo loquor vidit modis in novissimo officialis propter nostram testimonii. Si non procedat ad motus potius proventus."

The Merlin continued to speak, his Latin distinct and clear, as he smoothly approved the minutes of the last minute and moved past them, all following the rote of procedure. Alexandria bit back a flash of amusement as she realized he was following Robert's Rules of Order. A parliamentary format, used almost ubiquitously throughout important meetings around the world, seemingly both in this world and her old one. She could find no real fault with following such, it had served her fairly well.

There were no rumbles of dissent, just a loud, "Motion seconded."

"Aye." The audience voted, in a smattering of different languages, all affirmative. A small, sharp smile graced the Merlin's face, almost completely hidden by his distinguished silver beard.

Alexandria automatically translated the following words the Merlin spoke into English, "Given the circumstances, I also move to dispense with the usual formalities in order to discuss a more pertinent issue, our war with the Red Court."

As he spoke, the Merlin's eyes first widened and then bulged slightly in anger, even if his irritation did not enter his voice.

Wizard Dresden had arrived. He was clad in a bathrobe, which looked even more absurd on account of the fluttering blue stole around his neck, hanging unevenly, one side a whole third-of-a-meter farther down his body than the other. He was unshaven and looked even worse than Alexandria's overcoat.

Alexandria resisted the urge to raise an eyebrow. The White Court representative huffed under her breath, not sure whether to be scandalized or impressed, it seemed. The Jade Court representative just looked constipated.

"Consensum habemus?" The Merlin bit out, looking right at Dresden. Even so, the hall responded to his latin words, "All in favor?" with another general, "Aye."

In the loud awkward silence that followed, everyone could hear Dresden whisper loudly, "excuse me," as he shuffled past a blue-bearded wizard, with long black hair, and sat down beside an aging older wizard in a black robe with red stole.

"Magus Dresdenus," The Merlin admonished, before continuing to speak, "How thoughtful of you to join us in discussions of the war you started. It is good to know you have such respect for the Council."

The Merlin cast a knowing eye at Dresden's garb, before adding, "At least you have a stole, small mercies."

Dresden responded in halting and very bad Latin, words accented in a completely haphazard way, "I am sorry excuse, Merlin, a long sad day kept me. Me need better laundress."

The old wizard next to Dresden shook his head, the blue-bearded man next to him just blinked and looked at him as if he was an alien. Alexandria breathed in slightly, such were the perils of using a dead language.

Dresden went on to apologize or attempt a very bad apology, and Alexandria found herself sorely disappointed with Dresden. He had seemed to be at the very least competent, this wasn't very competent at all. In fact, he looked a little better than a moron.

Finally, Dresden whispered something to the old man next to him who nodded slightly, and stood smoothly, with a speed and dignity that belied his apparent age and delivered in crisp, perfect Latin, "Wizard Dresden apologizes for his conduct and appearance."

There was a brief murmur in the hall, and the expression on the Merlin could curdle milk, but he nodded, seeming temporarily mollified.

The Merlin spoke again, accepting the apology, acknowledging the speaker as Wizard McCoy, and then segued into a conversation on the death of Simon Pietrovich. Alexandria listened to this with interest. In no small part because of the mention of Archangel.

"It is fortunate then, that we have a survivor on hand, who can shed some light on this travesty," Ancient Mai murmured, but her voice still carried.

The Merlin nodded and called out, "Warden Baines, your report!"

Alexandria snapped her attention over to the doorway, as Baines stepped in, looking shaken. His grey cloak fluttered around him, and his face was still pale. The Warden that Luccio sent to accompany him and Dresden loomed behind him, hand still on his sword. Not in a threatening way, but more in a way that spoke of comfortable habit. He leaned slightly toward Baines, right before Baines entered, and whispered something quick into his ear.

Baines nodded and seemed to steel himself, straightening his shoulders and walking into the room, making his way toward the center dais. The Wardens around the room watched him intently, but none made to bar his passage.

He spoke in clear Latin, the faintest traces of another accent underlying it, "Honored Merlin and Council, I was not in Archangel when the wards fell, I only sought to close off the ways, as best I was able."

The crowd murmured. The Merlin paused a moment, "Be as it may, you must admit that it is suspicious that you survived and the wards were destroyed by someone with an intimate knowledge of their construction."

Baines swallowed, looking uncomfortable, and his eyes scanned the gathering. His face paled a shade paler as his eyes caught sight of her, over in the other tables.

The gaunt wizard behind the Merlin spoke then, his voice sharp, "Merlin, it is rather impossible that Baines did anything to the Wards, his talents do not lay in that area, rather in wayfinding."

The Merlin appeared to sigh, "Wizard LaFortier, your dedication to your apprentice is almost as great as Wizard McCoy's-"

"We should not discuss this with a Council position empty," La Fortier interrupted then, his expression dark. Something sharp glittered behind his eyes, as he turned the piece of parchment in his hands over and over. One of his hands, pale and with the long fingers of a pianist, drifted up to run a hand over his bald head.

The Merlin turned partially around, enough to glance at LaFortier before he turned back to the front with a frown.

"We will table this discussion then, Warden Baines take a seat," The Merlin responded curtly in Latin, his eyes finding Baines. Baines shuffled to the side and slipped into a metal folding chair. His eyes drifted across the room again, finding her. She turned slowly, just enough that he could see she acknowledged that she was there.

"I must request that Pierre Montjoy, as a long-standing member of significant renown, to take on responsibility as a Senior Council Member. All in favor?"

A venerable older man, whom the Merlin had eyed with triumph before, surged to his feet, "I refuse the nomination!"

His response was in English, and even though his voice croaked with age a strong tenor underlaid his words. A red stole rested around his black robes and numerous copper chevrons and a curious seal, unfamiliar to Alexandria, adorned it.

"You do?" The Merlin asked in Latin, appearing legitimately flabbergasted.

"My research into the Yucatán is of paramount importance, especially now that we finally offer war to the abominable anthropophages."

The Merlin grumbled, "Chichen Itza has sat undisturbed for centuries, there is no indication that we could gain anything of value by studying it, you know this Wizard Montjoy."

Montjoy frowned in turn beneath his impressive white beard, and finally, Alexandria placed his country of origin as he replied, he was Canadian.

"A miasma of dark magic still lingers over the temple there and the surrounding cenotes, an insight into the greater mystic workings of the Red Court is possible-"

"Very well," The Merlin cut Montjoy off, his eyes glancing toward the observer's section of the room, "Such a discussion is better left for another time, you refuse the nomination then?"

"I do," Montjoy replied, "I cannot in good conscience take such a position."

There was a pause, then, and the dark-skinned woman behind the Merlin murmured something indistinctly. Alexandria watched with interest as the Merlin's expression soured even further before he replied, addressing the room at large, "In accordance with the charter, we will offer the position to all wizards of appropriate seniority."

An aging Wizard identified by the Merlin as Peabody reached beneath his table and withdrew a raft of papers, and thumbed through them with ink-stained fingers. His thin, reedy voice, filled the room as he read off name after name. Wizard McCoy stood, but few others did.

Two declined, and the others were either absent, such as one Klaus Scheider, or occupied by what Alexandria surmised was code of some kind. After all, pyramid sitting was hardly a legitimate excuse. She concluded that it must be some kind of obfuscation on their hidden senior operatives, only spoken for formality's sake. It was a clever ruse if a little transparent in its intent. Of course, the possibility remained that they were legitimate, by why would they offer the locations of singular members, while at war, unless the binding oath was enough to guarantee no disclosure?

If so, that would be the most iron-clad non-disclosure agreement that she had ever seen. Truly, a worthy accomplishment.

"Do any other wizards wish to promote themselves for consideration over Wizard McCoy?" the Merlin finally asked as the ink-stained man, Peabody, concluded his recitation of the roster.

The hall was silent, a few of the White Council members looked at each other, weighing something. But they seemed to hold some kind of subtle respect for McCoy, who was the only man who remained standing.

This was the kind of person she was looking for, Alexandria concluded. A man outside of the current leadership who was ascending. Those in between transitions of power were always the most willing to listen to new ideas.

"Wizard McCoy, take your place upon the Senior Council."

Just after speaking the formal sounding words, Alexandria could see the Merlin's mouth moving with silent words that he did not speak out loud, a word of condemnation then, of irritation. Her skill in lip-reading allowed her to discern his words, "bloody colonials."

"Ah, an ascension to the Senior Council," The White Court blithered, her tone saccharine, "A rare treat."

Alexandria tilted her head just enough to regard her. Her expression froze, and she looked so much like a deer in the headlights. The words though, were valuable, even if the creature was irritating. Her tone seemed to indicate that she spoke truly and that meant that turnover in the Senior Council of the White Council was not usual. However, all of the members looked old, some positively ancient, such as Ancient Mai. Either they had all been young when they gained a position of seniority, or they possessed a way to extend their lives beyond their means.

Either option offered interesting information. For others, the prospect of immortality might be tantalizing, but for Alexandria, who had been living that reality, it was not nearly as captivating.

"Less talking, more doing," the newly appointed Wizard McCoy proclaimed to the hall in a strong voice, "There's a war on."

It was as much a challenge as anything. With several key words, McCoy had proclaimed his dissatisfaction with the current leadership and announced his intention to change things. Alexandria could see that the Merlin recognized exactly what McCoy had just accomplished as the wizards of the White Council in the audience nodded, heads bobbing.

"Precisely," the Merlin ground out, words biting, "what I was thinking. Let us address the war. Warden Morgan, would you please stand forward and give the Wardens' tactical assessment of the conflict?"

Alexandria turned her head slightly to track the motion as the aforementioned Warden, stalked his way toward the dais, his expression focused. His hand rested on his sword idly, and Alexandria noted the respect that glimmered across the faces of the White Council members that turned to look at him.

The Merlin ceded the center podium on the dais, as Morgan stepped up onto it, grey cloak swirling from the movement. The Merlin's intense blue eyes bore into him for a moment, before Warden Morgan offered a shallow, infinitesimally shallow, nod, and then turned to face the gathering.

In one hand he held a candle in the other a shard of crystal, the way the light refracted through it made her think emerald, his lips moved with silent words and then a hologram sprung forth, projecting a green holographic three-dimensional image of the Earth.

Alexandria permitted herself to lean forward, interested despite herself. The globe was misshapen, continents malformed, like archaic maps from ages past. For a moment, Alexandria wondered whether the Earth on this world was aberrant. There were some worlds that she had visited in which that was the case, others were barren, points of divergence long ago in forgotten epochs where life never flourished.

Still, it was a feat of note, especially since it didn't seem to be done with technology, but with the innate power of magic, and that was interesting. So far, the powers she had witnessed seemed to most ably lend themselves to feats of illusion, and this was further fuel for that theory.

Warden Morgan spoke, his Latin not nearly as polished, explaining the highlights, "-red spots on the map are the locations of-"

The red spots were where the Red Court had attacked, predominantly Europe, Western Europe but with fair dotting throughout the rest of Europe. Even with the distorted map of the world, Alexandria was able to pinpoint the spots on the spinning globe to points of interest on her mental map. Cities regarded as centers of culture or with long-standing roots to ancient institutions.

"Thank you, Warden," the Merlin interjected as Warden Morgan wrapped up his debriefing. Morgan deftly picked up the emerald and candle, backing away smoothly, glancing at the Merlin as he did so, before descending the podium. As he descended he snuffed the candle flame out with two fingers, making his way back toward the doorway.

"Warden Baines," The Merlin commanded, "As wayfinder, it was your duty to close the ways at Archangel."

Baines stood, looking a lot more composed and answered, again in Latin, "I succeeded in closing more than two-thirds of the ways, but failed to close all of them."

The Merlin frowned, "Grievous news, Warden Baines. Why did you fail in this singular duty entrusted to you?"

Baines swallowed, then answered, his voice hardening, "I was betrayed within my own sanctum, I do not know how the Red Court pierced the wards, they slipped through without me even knowing."

The Merlin regarded him for a moment, before LaFortier spoke, "These wards were the same ones that Simon Pietrovich wove? The ones layered over your family's wards?"

"Yes, Councilman LaFortier," Baines replied.

LaFortier frowned but did not say anything more.

"On that note," The Merlin replied, "We have the matter of the creature that helped you escape from the Red Court, Alexandria was it?"

Alexandria stood then, drawing the attention of the body of wizards toward her.

The Merlin turned slightly to regard her, Alexandria could see Ancient Mai whisper something to the Merlin, who spoke, "The Council recognizes observer 'Alexandria.'"

Unsaid was the question, 'Alexandria of-'?

She answered, the soft syllables of Ecclesiastical Latin spilling from her lips, each word perfectly accented. The time she had to devote to deciphering the linguistic drift in the convention so far was not enough to accurately discern the nuances. She did know perfect Latin, just not the Latin they were using. She deemed her mastery of the Ecclesiastical Latin sufficient.

"I freed Warden Baines from Winter, from the chains of the Red Court, and prevented him from appropriation by the Leanansidhe."

The Merlin regarded her for a moment, and Alexandria decided to namedrop, to see what sway Winter actually held over the proceedings, "The Queen of Winter directed me here, where the White Council could repay its debt for the rescue of one of its members."

Ancient Mai's attention sharpened, and she looked up from her podium. Her eyes climbed up to meet Alexandria, and there was consideration and wariness in her gaze. For all that her eyes were clouded and rheumy, her attention was sharp, like a honed blade. The White Court stiffened in her seat, and her eyes drifted back to her previous seat, evidentially rethinking her decision to sit at the table.

The Middle-Eastern man turned toward her then, brown eye narrowing, his lips twitched as if he was saying something but none of the others reacted. He frowned, a severe expression on a severe face.

The Merlin nodded, "The debt to Alexandria, owed by the White Council will be noted, with a simple motion. As an institution, we gain the right to stipulate if any repayment is deemed to be too egregious."

Ancient Mai spoke then, sharp words, for all that her voice croaked with age, "You claim to not be of Winter's get, yet use the title of the Winter Queen with familiarity."

Alexandria measured her response. It would be foolish to admit to being reborn, in body or spirit after her death. Just as it would be unwise to draw attention to the fact that she was from another world, especially if they had contact with other worlds as disastrous as Bet's own contact with Aleph or Shin.

"I have accomplished tasks for Winter before," she answered, thinking of both stopping the Red Court trespassers and somehow revealing the complicity of the Leanansidhe to the Winter Queen. That was not to mention her services to the little pixie, sequestered away with a nickel within her pocket.

"I stand against the Red Court," offered Alexandria, "My goals stand in opposition to all that seek the destruction of humanity."

It was a grandiose statement, one that she had made before at various public relations events, especially in the early years of the Endbringers, when the public needed the assurance of a stalwart defender. It was also the creed of Cauldron and it had always morbidly amused her to utter it openly, the guiding pathos behind all her deeds in life. The triumph of humanity over all obstacles, no matter the price, no matter how many bodies she needed to climb over. It was a grim amusement that led her to utter it here.

The Merlin seemed distracted for a moment, glancing toward Ancient Mai, who shook her head. Alexandria recognized the dismissal for what it was, and sat down, not discomfited in the least. He turned back around, and answered, even though Alexandria could detect some doubt in his voice, "The matter of debt can be settled later, let us continue. Ancient Mai?"

Ancient Mai unfurled a letter with her withered hands, holding it lightly for a moment, speaking before she began reading, "From Summer, we received this answer: "Queen Titania does not now, nor will she ever choose sides in the disputes of mortal and anthropophage. She bids both Council and Court alike to keep their war well away from the realms of Summer. She will remain neutral."

The Merlin's hand twitched but he restrained himself from saying anything, allowing McCoy to interject boldly, "And Winter?"

Ancient Mai let just the slightest frown grace her porcelain perfect features and then responded, implying irritation but not actually voicing it. Even Alexandria could admit that was so as Ancient Mai said, "Our courier has not returned. Upon consulting records of former conflicts, we may confidently assume that Queen Mab will involve herself, if at all, in a time and manner of her own choosing."

Alexandria's attention was drawn to Dresden as he set a pitcher of water down with a loud smack, which seemed to echo in the silence of the room. His hand shook slightly, a bandage twined around, staining with red on the palm as he raised his hand to drink.

McCoy scowled and responded, and was answered in turn by the Merlin, but Alexandria's attention remained focused on Dresden, as did the attention of a number of others. It was clear that Dresden knew something, and that something likely had to do with the Winter Queen. How curious, the Winter Queen was insidious indeed, her web was broad, enough to make hundreds dance to her tune.

The Senior Council bickered, as Dresden seemed to debate with himself. Only the Middle-Eastern man and LaFortier seemed focused on Dresden out of the Senior Council.

"Don't be a fool," The dark-skinned woman said sharply, tone like a knife, "They will never sue for peace."

"They already have, Wizard LaFortier, if you would," The Merlin replied, satisfaction coloring his tone smugly.

"Thank you Merlin," LaFortier replied, his voice smoother and more controlled than before, going on to explain how he had a missive from a Red Court noble suing for peace, and an armistice effective that very morning.

An exclamation burst from Dresden's mouth, causing the blue bearded man next to him to jump in his seat. Nearly the entire assembly turned their attention toward Dresden who hurried to explain exactly what his exclamation of 'Bullshit!' meant.

Baines stood next, right on the heels of the explanation, "Honorable Merlin, and Council, I must remind you that this very day I was held captive by the Red Court."

The Merlin frowned, and offered, "You were held captive by what you thought were Red Court, that remains inconclusive."

"The thralls aren't evidence enough, are they?" Dresden interjected then, tone quite caustic. Both LaFortier and the Merlin frowned at him, ignoring and dismissing Baines's words.

LaFortier proceeded to publicly chastise Dresden and Alexandria caught a fair number of the wizards frowning in turn. She watched with interest as LaFortier explained the Red Court's demands.

"Me?" Dresden replied.

The assembly rose in outrage, and the situation devolved. Alexandria leaned back in her seat, watching intently. Both the Court representatives next to her became increasingly uncomfortable the longer the outrage grew. The blonde in particular seemed on edge, her fingers taping a delicate staccato on the table's surface.

It appeared that the Council was torn on whether to hand over the Wizard Dresden, but he had supporters. It seemed the decision had some justification. Except for the idiom never to negotiate with terrorists, in this case, vampires. Alexandria did not consider agreeing to peace with the Red Court to be the winning move.

She stood, and murmured, making her way out of the hall, "I have seen enough."

**AN: Tried to keep it from rehashing canon and set up the plot threads sufficiently, let's see if I managed.**


	24. Chapter 24

**A Proposition of Delicate Force**

The cloudy day had cleared into the warmth of a late spring day. The city was arrayed below Alexandria, both familiar buildings and foreign architecture displayed for her purview. The cars moved sluggishly far below, like so many ants, going about their daily tasks.

This was one of the ways in which Alexandria was accustomed to seeing the world. A distant, perspicacious guardian, watching over the world as it passed below. Detached, yet beholden to the world. Free to act, but also constrained.

Alexandria was disappointed in the White Council, but at the same time, it was as she expected. The tangled tentacles of fear drove many to make decisions that were less than perfectly considered.

It was obvious that while the Red Court offered platitudes of peace, they acted with subterfuge to secure their position at the same time. Either the Red Court was so fractured that it was unaware of its components or it acted with deliberate malice.

She could find no real fault besides cowardice in those that wished to sue for peace. The Red Court seemed a formidable enemy, with comparably global scope to the White Council. The convention revealed that they were able to strike at Archangel and more disparate locations around the globe. It was a limited world war.

The wind buffeted her, pressing the overcoat against her body. Alexandria paid no attention for a long moment, not quite lost in thought but more considering. Her eye panned over the gleaming city below, drifting down familiar roads and places of interest. The Cloud Gate, its mercurial gleam clear ever from her position shone like polished silver in Millenium Park.

Northeast was Goose Island, unmarred, like she had first seen it so many years before when she traveled to Chicago. Before it's immolation. It brought an uncharacteristic somberness to her faults, and she could feel herself indulging in an expression that did not often come to her usually placid face. A frown.

The world itself seemed to spit in her face. Here was a Chicago as it should have been, without the excess of parahumans to engage in wanton acts of cruelty and violence. Alexandria was well aware that the Cauldron capes were more capable in controlling their urges as a norm but the conflict drive the normal agents impressed upon their hosts was far from controlled.

On occasion, Alexandria had ventured onto the other Earths, for careful manipulation where Contessa would not do, or rather Contessa's path drove her to delegate to Alexandria. Aleph's Chicago was much the same as this new one. Both here and on Aleph there weren't cheap newly constructed buildings lining what should've been old historic districts. Millennium Park and Wrigley Field were not smoldering heaps of radioactive refuse.

Alexandria pursed her lips. Now that she had managed to draw several distinctions between the two, it only seemed proper that she designate it properly. The Parahuman Response Team, as the first to identify another world, had used Phonecian Letters, remarkably similar to Hebrew.

The usage of the Phonecian letters had to do with the point of divergence. No divergences had stretched back farther than that point. Some day in the far future, if Cauldron ever succeeded in its Sisyphean task, the designations were meant to be something all the Earth's could understand and hold in common.

Following that tradition would lead it to this world being named something like Earth Pē or Earth Sādē, which hadn't been officially discovered by Earth Bet. Cauldron knew of countless more worlds, more than most could ever hope to count. Alexandria knew of each and every one. None of them had magic, wizards, or vampires. The other worlds were either barren, examples of divergent evolution or variations of the current state of affairs on Bet.

It was a further conundrum, that Alexandria did not like.

"Door me," she said, voice quiet, sound bit away by the wind. Yet, she knew if Clairvoyant was watching for her, he would see her and direct Doormaker to open the door. There was no response. No shimmering pane of light opening forward. No crisp hole in reality. Nothing at all.

Either Doctor Mother or Contessa had directed Doormaker to ignore her or there was something more to this world. It was a question that she would not be able to answer at this time, perhaps ever. As it were, she was forced to operate alone.

She turned in place, scrutinizing the city one last time. She was half-inclined to merely seek out the Red Court. End the war as smoothly as she was able. Yet, by all appearances, this was a shadow war, and thus she doubted it would be that easy.

Her eye paused on a distant building, registering something out of the ordinary. A great bird, almost eagle-like sat perched atop a gothic building, looking for all the world like an enormous gargoyle. A body, pink and skinless rested in its monstrously large talons.

For a moment, Alexandria was tempted to just leave whatever it was to its own devices. Her time would be better spent investigating the Red Court and ending their plague upon humanity. That was the path of the greater good. A path that had guided her throughout her second life.

It was a path that had led to her second death. She had given everything to humanity and Cauldron. Defiled her morality in exchange for humanity's continuation.

In the end, there was something she had forgotten. When Doctor Mother first asked what she wanted to do after her vial, after she had proven herself, she had said she wanted to be a hero. Doctor Mother had gotten a sad little smile then but just nodded. Cauldron had their first job for her barely a month later.

What left on that mission was a naïve little girl, secure in the golden ideal of the world. If everyone just got along then everything would be all right. It was a fiction not quite broken by her sickness. A fiction reinforced by her survival. She had to make a choice, one of many that would follow.

For too long she had passed off things that needed doing, excusing it with the trite, if true, words of Doctor Mother, saying it was for the greater good. Often it was, and that was the problem. Her mistake was allowing her idea of the greater good to bleed into her life until she was ignoring present problems because fixing them would distract her away from the plan.

Now none of that mattered. She could afford to save the one dangling from a bridge. She could afford to save the family over the train crash if she wanted. She doubted that she would, but the choice was present, no longer shadowed by greater colossuses.

She could make a difference to one person today.

The world blurred around her as she approached the bird, the wind shear straining at her buttons. Its large grey form perched like an obscene gargoyle atop its perch. An eye twitched in its head, tracking her approach as soon as she began to move, even across the expanse of open air. She slowed, taking in more details on the body, inconsistencies that stood out even to her. The fingers were too long on the corpse, the muscles arranged in alien ways.

The grey raptor unfolded its wings, keeping the ribcage of its prey pinned with a yellow scaled foot that was as large as the ribcage itself. Alexandria reigned in her speed, stopping just shy of the creature.

"Flyer," It rasped, voice distinctly inhuman. English words, with an underlying accent that was strange, almost echoing, almost rumbling, but not quite. The words themselves issued forth from a mouth that was completely unlike a bird, serrated teeth hidden beneath its hooked yellow beak.

It paused just after speaking its word, cocking its head. Its beak dripped with red blood. After a lifetime of weirdness, all power induced, it would have to be something more than a giant talking bird to faze Alexandria. She had seen strangers, had fought stranger beasts. All but the Siberian and the Endbringers had eventually fallen beneath her. For decades she had been seen as the brute of brutes. Earth Bet's invincible woman, no matter her continued failure against the only enemies that ever mattered.

Alexandria regarded it for a moment, eye dropping down to the body, "Who are you?"

She was half-tempted to say, 'what are you?' but the reaction of the bird, its knowledge of English, and the fact that keeping her cards close to her chest had only helped her so far led Alexandria to still her tongue.

"Onimkė, those that lived along the Ottawa called me such," the bird replied, voice rasping. It raised a great taloned foot to scrape at the blood on its beaked face. Its eyes were prisms, reflecting the light, endlessly swirling. It seemed profoundly unconcerned.

Alexandria paused, thinking. It was not a word she knew, and that was unique for a woman that always remembered everything she ever heard. The body that lay under its feet was dead, but this thing might have answers. She had pledged to defend humanity but that didn't mean she had to be stupid about it.

"What is that?" She gestured with one adamantine finger. The wind on the side of the building snapped at her sleeve. Her tone was steady, unyielding, despite being faced with a bird the size of the extinct Argentavis.

"Those that live along the shore and know call them ghouls, Flyer-without-Wings."

Ghouls? The Thousand and One Nights? Muslim folklore? Or more accurately pre-Islamic folklore from the Middle East. Widely regarded as eaters of the dead, plunderers of corpses. A creature then? Like the Red Court? Yet this creature was also inhuman. She wasn't able to make a judgment about whether it told the truth.

She floated closer, just slightly. The bird's head tilted watching her for a long instant. A single drop of blood ran down its beak and dripped upon the buttress it was perched atop. It lifted its feet, and the body twitched under the claw, moving with a gaping hole in its torso.

From this angle, Alexandria could now clearly see its prey. The bird, Onimkė, was right, it was not human, or at least did not appear human, just as she supposed before. Alexandria exhaled slightly, relaxing visibly. More for show, than for any actual purpose. If she wanted her body was entirely beholden to her, and would not display any emotion that she did not wish.

"A ghoul?" she asked, interested despite herself. So far the vampires and creatures she had met had been firmly in the camp of European folklore. Ghouls were distinctly Middle Eastern, mostly endemic to mythic depictions of the pre-Islam world.

The bird dipped its beak toward the body, seizing its head, eyes still watching her. The body twitched, flailed limbs trying to scratch at the bird. Alexandria watched almost dispassionately as it pulled on the head, there was a choked little gasp and then a brutal snap. Silver, mercury-like, fluid sprayed out from the gap between the body and head.

"A predator upon the upper world," The bird explained, dropping the head, which fell to the side, revealing an inhuman face, with a jaw filled with sharp teeth. It was human enough that Alexandria felt instinctive revulsion that quivered up inside her and was buried before it even shone to the outside world.

Alexandria floated forward, toward the bird, it did not flinch, just regarded her with prism-filled eyes. The air near it felt charged, almost static. Alexandria bent, reaching out a hand for the fallen head.

The bird stepped away, letting her pick it up. It snorted, "Your feathers are dark, Flyer-without-Wings, but you still belong to the upper world."

The flesh was slimy beneath her hands, Alexandria just examined it for a moment. The eyes were pale and clouded, like a corpse dead for several days. The smell was comparable, a body dead for several days. The face itself, even devoid of skin as it was, was unmistakably not human, the mouth, filled with long jagged teeth, stretched from ear to ear. The brow ridges were also too pronounced, more like what she would expect to see in an ape than a human.

Alexandria raised an immaculate eyebrow and turned toward the bird, letting the skull fall with a thud into a crevice on the gothic roof. Alexandria made a mental note to retrieve the skull at some point, where it was, nobody was liable to find it, ever.

"A fledgling," The bird explained, seeming to preen at the attention, "Striving for prey too far from its nest. Denizens of the underworld should take care not to infringe on what is the upper world's."

"What do you regard as the upper world?" Alexandria asked, interested. She had to admit that if there was a second organization enforcing order and preventing these mythological creatures from preying on humanity, she was interested in making their acquaintance.

There was a rustle and a small form shifted in her breast pocket, a moment later her little pixie pushed her head out of the pocket. Her pine needle dress was hanging off one shoulder and then she stretched her arms and yawned widely. Alexandria glanced down, just for an instant taking her eye off the large bird and darting her gaze down the little pixie.

"Oooh," the pixie said, seeming to register what was in front of her, her little hands clutching tightly at Alexandria's overcoat, but her words were excited, "Boom-bird!"

The bird flared its feathers, talons clenching into the stone buttress it was perched on. It flapped its wings once, not fully expanding its wings but enough that it seemed to demonstrate some degree of irritation. It seemed entirely too proud to say it found its designation as 'boom-bird' rather demeaning.

Alexandria cupped one hand over her breast pocket and the little pixie, "hush."

The bird gave the pixie an evil eye, snorting lightly as if to say 'boom-bird indeed.'

The name did allow Alexandria to draw the connection between the reality in front of her and the legend the bird originated from. The stupid little epithet that the pixie used was just enough information that she could say with some certainty what she was dealing with.

"Your hatchling should take care," the bird replied, flexing its feathers again, "some would see such an insult irredeemable."

"I will bear that in mind," Alexandria replied, tone just a tad frosty. The pixie might have offended the creature in front of her, but the pixie was also under her protection and infinitely smaller than the thunderbird.

"We have met for a purpose," the bird continued, flexing its wings again. Alexandria risked a glance down from the building at the street below. There were several people walking about below, none looked skyward. There were no gathered surveillance helicopters or lookouts that she could spot.

Down one long alley, quite a distance away, there was a child, clutching a tattered white teddy bear to her chest and looking around frantically. There was a rustle of feathers near Alexandria, and she turned back toward the over-sized bird.

The buttress was empty, both the bird and the body were gone, only red and silver stains remaining to mark their one-time presence. Alexandria's searching eyes found the head of the ghoul still jammed between the crevice, then her eyes were drawn skyward.

It was a large bird, there were few ways it could escape so easily without a stranger power or a mover power. Most stranger powers had flaws which were easily revealed to her immutable mind, the subtle influence fields they wove not nearly enough for a perfect memory. Stranger powers that relied on the visible spectrum and manipulating the physical world were harder to note.

Harder but not impossible. The distant boom of thunder rolled over the city, spreading like a distant cannon shot. The air was clear, as were the skies. The symbolism was not lost on Alexandria.

"Boom-bird?" The pixie asked.

"Boom-bird indeed," Alexandria answered, lips quirking slightly.

Yet, her eyes traversed the length of the city again, drawn down to the little girl, standing alone, holding a little white bear to her chest.

The air rippled around her, an air bubble forming for a moment as she moved in the space between one moment and the next, slowing down just enough at the final descent that she did not tear her clothes away. This speed was also stopping just shy of shattering the windows below her with the sheer speed of her flight.

Her feet touched the ground softly by the girl, making nary a sound. Still, it almost seemed the girl could somehow feel her since she turned around in the next moment, looking up at Alexandria with a doleful expression.

"Where's my Mommy?" She asked. Blinking slowly up toward Alexandria.

A pale, fetid creature, scaled skin, and bones with a gaping maw of teeth froze from where it had been creeping toward the child. Yellowish saliva dangled from a veritable mouthful of pointed teeth. Its baleful pale eyes fixed on her, like the cold dead eyes of a fish, left to die on a riverbank.

One second it was there, in the next silver mercury blood splattered the front of Alexandria's overcoat, the ghoul collapsing around Alexandria's fist. The resistance of flesh to her strike was so infinitesimally small that it barely even registered, except for Alexandria's mind which cataloged every sensation she had ever experienced. The ghoul came apart, the kinetic energy too great for its withered flesh to endure.

Alexandria let a frown dance over her grim countenance. A lawyer could probably claim that the creature had not yet acted with ill intent, but Alexandria was not a lawyer and was not playing games. The creatures of this world were out of control, and Alexandria considered the fact that she had to do something about it after all.

Barely a moment had passed, the girl's eyes drifted open from the slow tired blink she had gifted Alexandria. A boon that allowed her to act, instantaneously, to stop the ghoul from doing whatever it intended.

The girl herself was small, maybe seven, and dressed in a little white dress with pink flowers embroidered on it. The hem of the dress was stained with dirt. All Alexandria could think was, at least her innocence was saved today. The glassy dead eyes and scattered body parts of the ghoul were a testament to that fact.

"Where are your parents, child?" she asked, voice soft and soothing, perfectly tailored to ease the fear the little girl was feeling. It was also carefully calculated to keep the little girl's attention on her and keep her from glancing behind at the alleyway. In some ways, it was no worse than Bet, clear and present danger looming all around if you just had the eyes to see it. It seemed she had her job cut out for her.

"A pixie!" The child said, looking at Alexandria's breast pocket on the overcoat. Alexandria glanced down and smiled lightly at the sight of the pixie's small head peeking over the pocket's edge at the child. The pixie clutched the nickel in one hand and stared at the child.

"She's mine," The pixie said, declaring so to the world, "You can't have her."

Alexandria ignored the pixie and extended a hand to the child, "Let me help you."

The child seemed to waver, eyeing the outstretched hand for a moment. Alexandria approved, at least her parents had taught her not to trust strangers, even if they had been less than perfect in teaching her not to get lost. The little girl's bright blue eyes darted upward to Alexandria's pixie again.

She grabbed Alexandria's hand. The touch was featherlight against her immovable skin, and Alexandria smiled reassuringly.

"Close your eyes a moment," Alexandria suggested soothingly.

The girl looked up at her questioningly for a moment, seeking something in her gaze. That was the thing about children. So easy to trust. Even when they should know better. It reminded her of her Wards. It was a pity that she had taken it upon herself to deal with the problems, rather than the cute ones. Few crossed her way that were as innocent or young as the girl in front of her. By the time they got to her, they were disillusioned with the world, grasping at nebulous shadows and jaded.

The girl nodded sharply and closed her eyes. Alexandria clutched her gently by the shoulder, one arm sliding behind her head and darted into the air. The wind whistled for a moment as she spun in place above the city, scanning for a police car. She may not have the time to track down the girl's mother unless it was immediately obvious, but she was still capable of indirect delegation.

"Keep your eyes closed," Alexandria ordered as the little girl's eyes threatened to flicker open.

There! Alexandria descended, still cradling the little girl carefully in her grasp. She was not accustomed to carrying passengers, they hampered her too much, especially when she was engaged in combat. However, over her long career, she had still managed to carry different individuals of all shapes and sizes, as the situation demanded. All but the first few survived without injury. That was early on before she truly knew her own strength.

She touched down, a whisper of wind on the tarmac. A white police Ford Interceptor sat in an empty parking lot. The red words, 'Chicago Police' were emblazoned on the side in large letters. On the blue line that transected the car was another phrase in white, 'we serve and protect.' A variation on a common police slogan, utterly unremarkable for how common it was. At least it wasn't a variation of, 'to punish and endure' as she once witnessed in a small Texas town back in 2008.

She dropped into the line of sight of the driver and passenger. Two police officers, who looked like they were eating an early lunch. Alexandria barely registered the disgust at the consumption of fast food that the officers of the law were eating. She might no longer really care about what she ate, or even really taste anything, but that didn't mean she didn't insist everyone under her command stayed fit. Fast food was just bad for nutrition on so many levels. In a career where the unexpected regularly happened, there really wasn't room for obesity that wasn't related to medical causes.

So sue me, Alexandria thought to herself, I'll admit to being a health nut.

One of the officers choked on his mouthful of Big Mac, suddenly realizing that a woman had just dropped out of the sky in front of him with a small child. To his credit he was immediately on the move, followed in a moment by his partner, a large man with a red handlebar mustache.

Alexandria spared just a moment and then blurred away. She was well aware that departing the scene might potentially cause more issues. She had repeatedly drilled into her subordinates the need for following the law, but she deemed her continued presence unnecessary, especially when she was being stalked.

She blurred to a stop in a deserted alleyway, just outside a brick and mortar pizza restaurant. The sun was shadowed overheard, casting the alley in darkness. A discarded newspaper fluttered in the draft Alexandria's passage caused. She spared a dispassionate glance down at the paper for a moment, the date catching her attention for a moment, '2001.'

The terrorist attack on Earth Aleph, her bare foot came down on the newspaper, stopping it in place and letting the shards of glass beneath pierce into the paper. September 12th, 2001. Her eyes darted over the alleyway, spotting another soiled newspaper, as barely legible as the one under her foot. January 2002.

So, she had traveled through time as well as space. From 2011 to at least 2002. Such a possibility did not seem possible. True time travel had seemed beyond the powers of the agents. There had been outliers, like Grey Boy who were able to rewind time but never on the scale that would be involved in turning a whole world backward.

The shadows rippled, moving slightly, a large cat, lanky and lean, about the size of a cougar, seemed to seep free. Its fur was almost vanta black in places, in others it was the hue of pitch. Black on black hue. Its eyes were large and luminous.

Its broad paws stepped over smashed glass without making a single sound, treading silently closer to Alexandria. It seemed to grin almost, revealing white teeth and a pink mouth.

"B-big Malk," the pixie trilled, her voice edged with panic. She dived down into the pocket, away from the luminous eyes of the large cat. Its hair was coarse and heavy making it look like an oversized Maine coon, albeit one the size of a cougar.

"Your declaration caused such consternation in Winter," the cat said conversationally, shredding the tarmac of the alleyway, as it kneaded it beneath black pitch-colored claws. Its voice was between a rumble and a purr, a voice that dwelled into infrasound. An inhuman voice, speaking English but in a distinctly inhuman way. It didn't even care about trying to make its voice sound human.

At this point, Alexandria wasn't even surprised by a talking cat. After a day filled with mythical creatures and talking birds, it wasn't even that shocking. What did concern her was the words of the cat, her declaration to the White Council?

It also implied something important. A declaration in affirmation of humanity had concerned Winter, which this cat seemed to speak on behalf. If Winter was concerned about such, then she needed to be wary in dealing with them.

Alexandria lifted off the ground some, letting herself float unhindered by the ground. A cold breeze whistled down the alleyway from on high, swirling her overcoat around her and throwing the newspaper that was under her foot down the alleyway.

"You speak for Winter?" Alexandria asked, scrutinizing the cat, "who are you?"

"Sìth am I," the cat, the malk, replied, amusement dancing behind his slitted green eyes. He treaded silently forward again, seemingly unbothered by the debris and hazards of the alleyway, the crushed glass fragments, and the littered hypodermic needles. There was a broad white spot, gleaming snow white, at the center of its breast. It was utterly unblemished white, pristine in its purity.

Malk? The pixie had mentioned malks in Winter before. Then she hadn't given much heed to the designation but now she found it interesting. The name itself, if it was being applied to a category of fairy creature, was probably a reference to the grimalkin or graymalkin of Scottish highland legend.

The name Sìth was less useful than it suggested. Alexandria doubted that the cat was a card-carrying member of a pop culture evil organization with delusions of grandeur that wielded plasma swords. Instead, Sìth was used in the archaic sense, as in the Scottish Gaelic daoine sìth. All that such a name told her was the cat considered itself a fairy.

However, there was a legend of a cat with the name Sìth. Cat Sìth was said to be either a fairy or a witch that could turn into a cat nine times.

"Cat Sìth, I presume?" Alexandria answered.

The cat grinned, its pearly white fanged mouth open from ear to ear.

"You are sharp," it noted, letting a dark chuckle that was more a rumble issue free from its chest.

"Why are you following me?" Alexandria asked forcefully, not moving a single centimeter as the cat padded closer, still completely and utterly silent. Not even a rustle of paper or the crunch of class beneath its padded feet.

"Winter owes such a debt," Cat Sìth hissed, his long black tail flicking back and forth behind him, "It would be such a tragedy if you perished before we could satisfy it."

The malk looked at her with half-lidded eyes for a moment, still grinning, before sitting on his haunches, tail still flicking idly.

"The Winter Queen sent you?" Alexandria queried briskly, her voice cold. It was not a possibility that she had not considered. By all appearances, the debt Winter owed was quite immense. It seemed akin to finding a traitor in the highest echelons of a foreign government. With the weight of debts, it appeared it would look poorly on Winter if such a service went unfulfilled if the claimant died.

"Perhaps," Cat Sìth replied, still looking amused.

Alexandria raised an eyebrow, "I see."

"What made the Winter Queen think I required protection?" The very idea was laughable to Alexandria really. She was Alexandria after all, not some blithering idiot. She knew her limits. She knew when to give up and leave a city to its destruction. She hadn't survived for years by being stupid.

"Ah," Cat Sìth replied, his grin Cheshire-like, "Your death still stains you, Library of Alexandria."

The intonation pulled at something inside her, like a string being plucked, and Alexandria paused, even her mind couldn't help but recall the taste of chitin and silk in her throat. Very carefully, Alexandria prevented any shred of emotion from gracing her face.

"I don't see why that matters," she replied, tone quite curt.

Cat Sìth stood, sniffing at the ground for a moment when he had been sitting and bending to look underneath the rusted steel dumpster that stood to the side, paint fraying from its face.

"Maybe it matters, maybe it doesn't," the malk replied easily, lifting its head and regarding Alexandria again with green eyes that were no longer half-lidded with amusement.

Alexandria snorted at the non-answer, indulging in an uncharacteristic display of emotion at the glib response and made to answer. However, the great black cat just swished its tail and seeped into the dumpster's shadow between the space between one heartbeat and the next. Alexandria eyed the shadow for a long moment. There was no discoloration. No deeper umbral shadow. It stayed uniform, no evidence of Cat Sìth remained. Alexandria slowly panned her solitary eye over the alleyway. There was nobody else around.

Quite a potent stranger power.

She pursed her lips and considered what the fairy cat had just relayed to her. There was some kind of hidden danger which she remained unaware. Her debt was also great enough that Winter seemed to have a vested interest in her remaining alive so that they could reimburse her. Lastly, there also appeared to be some kind of rumor, or knowledge that she had actually died.

The last thought was the most unpleasant. Even though she could still remember her death with perfect clarity, the small irrational part of her mind demanded that she was wrong. That she hadn't actually died. This was confirmation, albeit confirmation tinged by the words of a creature she did not believe was an ally, except by the weight of debt.

Cat Sìth also answered questions freely, when by all indication he should have bargained with her for information. There was little about personal debt in the conversation, which seemed to imply that his answering of her questions was related to some other debt he held. Debts within debts.

She floated free of the alleyway, staring up at the pizza shop next to the alleyway for a moment. The windows were dark, and the inside was trashed. A rat scurried along the wall. It was no wonder that the alleyway was dilapidated, with the condition of the buildings around it.

The street was mostly empty, a lone white van making its way slowly down the side opposite her.

It was all the more noticeable when she heard the crunch of loose asphalt beneath someone's feet. She could hear three heartbeats. Two measured and beating sedately, one faster than the other but not by much. The final, third heartbeat, was beating a steady staccato beat.

She turned, her eyes passing over empty space for a moment before her eye caught the glimmer in the air. An otherwise perfect illusion, but once she noticed one slight, almost imperceptible flaw, the rest came unwound.

Three wizards stood before her. The exceedingly tall Middle Eastern man from the Senior Council was the first she noticed. A steel eye sat in his eye socket. He stared at her without expression. His face was shadowed by the black cowl of his robe. His one visible eye seemed to gleam as he looked at her.

Ancient Mai, wizened and old, stood unaided next to him. A sharp frown pulling at the edges of her mouth. She was still clad in the black robe and purple stole of her office. A jade hairpin secured her elegant coiffure. Contrary to the first encounter Ancient Mai clutched a staff that looked like it was made from carven green jade. The image of a temple foo dog, facing in all four cardinal directions ordained its head.

Next to Ancient Mai was her granddaughter, also clad in her black robe and blue stole. She clutched in her hand a red rosewood staff, lines of green jade that looked almost machined carved into her staff. A bead of sweat ran down the side of her head.

"Inadequate, granddaughter," Ancient Mai murmured softly, shooting a sharp glance that clashed with her almost distant looking eyes. The last wisps of the illusion faded, shattering like stressed glass.

Alexandria floated forward, looking at all three of them steadily. None of the three met her gaze, but the Middle-Eastern man was the most fluid about it. If Alexandria was not actively trying to meet his gaze, she might not have even noticed he was avoiding giving it.

"You claimed to stand with humanity, yet dismissed the White Council," Ancient Mai croaked, her voice covered over with the veneer of old age.

"I stand with humanity," Alexandria replied, voice resolute, "The White Council considered casting one of its own aside under faulty pretense. It is obvious the Red Court has no interest in real peace. Their actions speak for themselves."

Ancient Mai was still frowning, but she looked almost considerate as well, "I assume it would please you to hear that Wizard Dresden was not stripped of his status and protection it affords."

Alexandria did not deign to answer that claim. Instead she pursued a different line of questioning, "Why have you sought me out?"

"The White Council has accepted we owe a debt to you," Ancient Mai replied, her voice still thin, "As a gesture of goodwill."

She tossed a cloth bag, drawn up with a drawstring at Alexandria's feet.  
"What is it?" Alexandria asked, not glancing down.

Ancient Mai's lips twitched, and she replied, "Clothes."

Alexandria ignored the clothes for the moment, "I don't suppose that is all?"

Ancient Mai shot the Middle-Eastern man a glance, more like a heavily veiled glare and opened her mouth to reply, but was cut off.

"Some know me as Rashid," he interrupted, voice smooth, "Would you care to explain the dichotomy before me?"

Ancient Mai shot a startled glance at him, gnarled fingers grasping tightly around her staff.

"What dichotomy?" Alexandria replied.

"I see a number that repeats three times. There is a facsimile of a golem before me," he answered, and his steel prosthetic eye seemed to strip away, revealing a glimmering dark hole in his eye socket, "Yet there is a young girl, broken by her own body-"

Alexandria was already moving the moment she figured out what the man, Rashid, was talking about. The air boiled around her, igniting in plasma as she lashed out.

Her adamantine fingers impacted against a pane of suddenly materialized glimmering blue light. A sharp brown eye bore into hers for another moment, the force of her strike redirected into the ground by the force field.

The asphalt cracked, enormous spiderwebs tearing their way across it. The building nearby shook, and glass shattered down the street behind Alexandria. Rashid exhaled, and in the sudden silence, the noise was almost shaky. Groaning, the stone pizza shop next to the four collapsed into a cloud of concrete dust. Mai looked on with an unreadable expression, just the slightest tensing of her fingers on her staff. Ancient Mai's heart beat faster within her chest, not that noticeably but just enough for Alexandria to notice. The granddaughter whipped her head around just in time to catch the collapsing building, she winced subtly and tried to look nonchalant, but she was betrayed by how nervous she obviously was, clutching at her her staff and twisting it in her fingers.

"Do not speak of secrets that are not yours to tell," Alexandria commanded curtly.

The wizard, Rashid, seemed to stare at her for another long moment. Then he seemed to look past her, up over her shoulder. Begrudgingly, he nodded slowly, returning his gaze to her face.

"Perhaps it is not yet the proper time," he replied, almost seeming to furrow his brow but not quite committing to such an action. He frowned, his eye bleeding back into a steel ball bearing within his head. Alexandria took note of the twin silver scars that bisected it, continuing down to terminate in his black and silver beard.

"I doubt you came to speak cryptic words," Alexandria replied. Her anger simmered like an unemptied cup within her chest. She had always been good at keeping her cards close to her chest, anything that broke that rule irritated her immensely.

"You are correct," Rashid replied, voice smooth and rolling once more.

"The White Council has need of your services," Ancient Mai replied, voice quiet, for all that she was shooting Rashid a side-eyed glare, "You have acted with uncharacteristic benevolence on behalf of Warden Baines. We would be interested in seeing if such good fortune extends to the rest of the Council."

"The White Council's debt still stands?"

"It does," Ancient Mai affirmed, face placidly calm, "does your claim to stand with humanity still stand?"

Alexandria nodded sharply, "The survival of humanity is paramount."

"The survival of Warden Baines and his subsequent testimony has revealed a possibility to us, one which we did not consider," Ancient Mai continued, voice dropping lower as she spoke. She paused at the end as if she was unsure whether to speak or not.

Her granddaughter seemed to be scanning the rooftops of the nearby buildings, both present yet removed from the conversation. Alexandria did not relinquish control of the conversation by asking for clarification, instead, she just waited Ancient Mai out. After a moment that was edging toward awkward, Ancient Mai continued, "With Baines's testimony and the noted absence of Wizard Pietrovich's death curse, it is possible that he survived."

Alexandria frowned. Why exactly were they coming to her with such information? The possibility that they trusted or knew that she could do something about it was infinitesimally small.

"What makes you think I can assist the White Council," Alexandria replied.

"Our list of allies is thin," Ancient Mai replied, seeming unbothered about giving out such critical information, "Few stand poised and ready to attempt such a task."

Alexandria raised an eyebrow, silently questioning why exactly they thought she was perfect for this task.

"We cannot spare any Wardens, not for such an uncertain possibility," Ancient Mai continued, voice quiet. Her rheumy eyes met Alexandria's for less than a second and then slipped away again.

"He's a member of your Senior Council, your leadership, and retrieving him from the Red Court is not a priority?"

Ancient Mai grimaced, the expression looked unnatural on the aged face. She replied, "The Red Court does not have him. That we do know."

"What do you know?" Alexandria replied in turn.

Ancient Mai seemed to smile slightly. After all, by asking the question Alexandria had allowed Ancient Mai to see that she was leaning toward taking the request. Rashid still stared at her, as if she was a puzzle piece left upon a chessboard. His brow was furrowed, and he looked up and above her periodically. His mouth moved silently, lips twitching almost imperceptibly as he muttered words unheard.

"The amulet Baines had was tainted with Summer magic, we suspect they had something to do with Pietrovich's survival," Ancient Mai closed her mouth after speaking those words. With annoyance, Alexandria realized that was all they had. She floated off the ground for a moment, letting her overcoat dangle.

This seemed almost like some cosmic test. For so long she had turned away from the petty deeds in favor of great deeds. Saved the bus over the bicyclist. Always prioritizing the best outcome over merely satisfactory. Always weighing her choices and time.

She could return to where she was before, acting on grand deeds for the greater good. Or, she could go back to help on a small scale. Making a big difference for one person at a time.

"I want Baines," Alexandria replied finally.

"I'm afraid that's not possible," Ancient Mai offered an uncomfortable smile, her tone very bureaucratic sounding. Alexandria did not question it, Baines wasn't that important in the grand scheme of things. There were plenty of others.

"My granddaughter will have to suffice as our liaison," Ancient Mai continued as Alexandria continued to stare at her.

The granddaughter, who had been staring with concentration at the alleyway Cat Sìth disappeared into, sent a startled glance their way. Rashid frowned, regal features still as he cast a look sideways as well but offered no protest.


	25. Chapter 25

**Confession and Revelation**

A chill wind, the last vestige of a winter breeze, swirled down the road, rustling the newspapers that lay scattered throughout the nearby alleyway. A bottle fell over with a tinkle of glass on the tarmac.

In the distance there was a car horn, sharp and loud, then fading toward nothing. The shrill sound of sirens echoed faintly up the streets of the concrete jungle. Alexandria's eye shifted slightly, still keeping the three in front of her within her vision but glancing at the collapsed concrete and faux brick ruin.

The ability that Rashid demonstrated to redirect force was unique, for all that she had encountered similar redirective powers before. Assault, formerly Madcap, for one, of the East-North-East PRT was able to absorb and expel kinetic energy.

Rashid however, had been able to both redirect the energy of her warning strike and also bleed the heat away, dissipating both at the same time all through the use of a plane of force. She hadn't considered it then, but it was quite impressive. Alexandria also inwardly chastised herself for not being prepared for being rebuffed. Her intention was never to land the blow, merely a feinting strike to rattle him, set him off balance, and most importantly persuade him to stop spilling private secrets of hers.

She also wasn't unused to causing immense collateral damage, but usually, it was controlled by her, rather than redirected in a way she hadn't anticipated. The nearby building's foundations were probably completely wrecked and the whole block would need to be demolished if the spiderwebbed asphalt was any indication. Alexandria didn't feel overly remorseful, destruction was a regular facet of her life and just something she had to learn from.

More interesting had been the careful non-reaction exhibited by Rashid and Ancient Mai. Both were startled and worried but did an admirable job occluding their actual feelings. Their micro-expressions had been relatively little match for her sheer focus and ability to discern the nuances of every expression. Rashid had been confident, more so than she would have expected, almost as if he had prepared for her strike.

Yet there had also been relief when he had successfully parried the blow. Alexandria felt she could surmise that he had some kind of precognition or was just supernaturally good at reading her, which she didn't think was likely. A benefit of her statuesque physiology meant that she needed to make an active deliberate effort to show any micro-expression except the most heartfelt.

Ancient Mai was more visibly startled, insofar as she certainly did not expect violence to erupt. Her reaction was fast, bordering on the supernatural herself but still fundamentally among human norms, even taking into account her evidentially advanced age. She had the face of a stateswoman. The demeanor of a career solon, implacable unless you had quick eyes to catalog the briefest flits of micro-expressions. Alexandria had such an eye. Ancient Mai was rattled but hid it better than anyone Alexandria had ever seen.

The weak link of the three was Ancient Mai's granddaughter. Her eyes had dilated when she realized what happened, and Alexandria had seen her pulse visibility jump in the side of her neck. Had seen the aborted movement of her lips and throat as she mouthed reassurances to herself, words, perhaps even spells, Alexandria posited with amused reflection. The pallor of her face, white with stress and stark terror. She had neither the statecraft experience of her elder nor the rigid control and advantage of second sight.

All valuable information. More puzzle pieces to the ever-growing tapestry that helped Alexandria slide the facets of the world into her existing paradigms. It also revealed subtle facts about the enemies the white council faced. Enemies where displaying surprise was detrimental. Where loss of face was almost as bad as actual defeat. Yet, the White Council was allowing a younger member, certainly less-skilled, to treat with her.

It was callously obvious what they intended the younger woman to serve as, but Alexandria couldn't find fault with their purpose precisely. She had made similar decisions and gestures during her long tenure as chief director and even as Alexandria, greatest heroine of them all.

In the present moment, Rashid made a sharp gesture, barely moving more than his black-gloved hand, in a direction away from all three. Away from Alexandria, Ancient Mai, and Ancient Mai's granddaughter. The world slid apart, a place of other-space intruding. The crisp straight lines and abrupt interruption were at once familiar and unfamiliar to Alexandria.

It looked so painfully like one of Doormaker's doors that for an instant she almost believed that Cauldron had come to reclaim her. That she could stand against the enemies that plagued Earth Bet once more. The dimensions were off.

When Doormaker opened a portal in a clear space, which the abandoned street was, each portal was perfectly uniform. An exact copy of other portals made in open areas. The only time the size of the portal diverged was with directed input from a Cauldron member. The edges were razor-thin, almost monomolecular on Doormaker's portals, but they were there. This portal was seamless, Alexandria could not even perceive an edge, just an abrupt transition in another dimensional plane.

"We are needed elsewhere, time already draws short," Rashid offered as explanation, dark brown eye drifting toward her eye, but never actually meeting her gaze.

Ancient Mai frowned, in turn, casting a quick glance at her granddaughter who looked like she was going to faint. She did not offer a gesture of reassurance or even spare a word. Instead, she stepped through the portal into a world of green grass that twisted and grasped at her ornate hanfu shoes. The grasping grass withered and grew placid beneath her feet, some subtle tremor emanating from her.

Rashid paused but a moment longer. He broke his eye away from Alexandria to regard Ancient Mai's granddaughter, almost seeming to hesitate. He gave a little nod, something that might've been reassurance or could've been interpreted as permission for something. The granddaughter just stared, semi-blankly at him, her hand white-knuckled around her jade veined redwood staff.

The portal into the other world slipped shut, leaving Alexandria to her ruminations. It seemed possible that the White Council was able to travel between worlds, in much the same way that Cauldron had been able too. However, just one data-point was not conclusive. The portal could also just be the entrance mode to an artificial dimension or even another location on this Earth. Furthermore, even if they possessed a method of interdimensional travel it was unlikely to work on the same wavelength as Doormaker, given Doormaker had not even deigned to respond to her requests.

Alexandria turned glacially slowly, breeze rippling across her overcoat. Inlaid silver thread flared blue along the sleeves of the overcoat, just barely perceptible under her peripheral vision. The overcoat was far sturdier than its appearance would suggest. Her speed had barely threatened to thread it, even when most contemporary garments would have been shredded. One saving grace of Dresden, he had quality constructed clothes, even if its grungy appearance left much to be desired.

It was also the reason her little fae companion remained unharmed. The pixie, as if summoned by Alexandria's errant line of thought pulled herself free of the pocket, wiggling her little pine dress and escaped into the air, flitting into Alexandria's hair. She brushed against Alexandria's ear, a giggle that was more tinkling laughter drifting from her diminutive form. She offered no crucial insight so Alexandria completed her turn to the granddaughter uninterrupted.

"You can use illusions with some modicum of skill, I assume?" Alexandria harshly demanded an answer from her liaison with the White Council.

"Yes," the reply came quickly, some steel behind the English words. She had a perfect midwestern American accent, a quality that she shared with her grandmother. Some color seemed to be returning to the woman's cheeks.

Alexandria deigned to note that the granddaughter definitely seemed to be more than a complete pushover. Not as timid as she first appeared. She was still dressed in the black robe of the White Council uniform, her blue silk stole clinging to the black fabric of her robe. At her side was a small white leather satchel, embroidered with white thread, forming a script reminiscent but different from Mesopotamian cuneiform.

Alexandria could not read it exactly. Persian cuneiform was a cakewalk, a devoted specialist could decipher the meaning behind words easily with the appropriate guides. She had once spared a moment to memorize such guide texts, even though there would've been better uses of her time. A bet was a bet, and in the early days, before the directorate of the PRT had fallen to her she had enough time to spend hundreds of sleepless nights poring under the books in the Los Angeles Public Library. Now and then she even made trips to the New York Public Library to peruse the books within. Millions of words an hour, paragraphs and pictures remembered with perfect clarity. There were very few topics of which she did not possess at least a mote of passing knowledge. This was Assyrian-Babylonian cuneiform, utterly useless to try and memorize the rules for, especially when each tablet almost required its own expert.

She could at least tell the idea the letters formed, after all, it was in ideogram form. Some kind of protective message. A ward, to use the terminology of the denizens of the world she found herself in.

"Good," Alexandria replied, barely an instant passing in the world beyond her thoughts.

In a smooth motion, Alexandria knelt, feet briefly touching the ground, and plucked the grey drawstring bar from the shattered asphalt. One side of the bag was a shade lighter than the other, Alexandria noted, but the contents did not seem affected.

The bag was light, which might've been significant except for the fact that weight didn't really matter much to Alexandria anymore. It could've weighed ten thousand pounds and she would've still felt only the slightest echo of what could be pressure if she allowed it.

The drawstring bag opened with no effort. One length of the rope, of course, receding into the bag, out of reach. That was what Alexandria hated about drawstring bags, they were so inconvenient, the ropes almost whimsical if they were made poorly. She had never liked drawstring hoodies for the same reason, one too many times fumbling around for the rope.

She much preferred suits.

"What do they call you?" Alexandria asked, leaving the question open to interpretation. She could take it as a request for a codename, a moniker, an alias, or even her real name. It was about as much a cessation of knowledge-gathering as Alexandria was willing to give.

The woman's face was carefully placid as Alexandria looked up from the opened bag, brow raised in question. Her fingers tightened along her staff, in what Alexandria would call a nervous gesture. Uncertain.

"Yu," she replied.

"Appropriate," Alexandria replied, eye flashing down to the jade inlaid into Yu's carven red staff. Yu could mean jade when it was used as a name, or it could be used as a name for rain if it was intoned differently. It could also mean 'extra' which would be a cruel name to give a child, but an adult would probably understand it was meant as 'jade.'

Analysis of names, etymology, was an important skill. The majority of capes fell into the pitfall of selecting a name that was connected to their powers. Sometimes it was a harmless choice, or the namer held sufficient skill and power that elucidating their chosen quality did not result in vulnerability. More often the inverse was true, and the name revealed crucial details about an individual's powers. Such folly had been the ruin of many villains and heroes.

Simple names were best, names of objects, or qualities. Names like 'Legend' or 'Eidolon' which were not references, oblique or not, to the inner workings of how their powers worked.

Yu pursed her lips, evidentially biting back some kind of comment. She didn't dare to speak it, however, and hence Alexandria returned her attention back to the drawstring bag full of clothes.

"Pretty!" The pixie squeaked, her voice like a tiny bell next to Alexandria's head.

It was passable. A blouse in a deep red color. The cut was fine, Alexandria couldn't help but note that there was no way it was going to stay on her body if she even moved moderately fast while flying. The buttons were weak, it was more a dress piece than anything durable. Made to look nice, not function well. Well, by most people's standards it would probably be considered both pretty and functional, but to Alexandria, it was just pretty, not functional.

She draped it over the arm holding the drawstring bag and pulled free the next article of clothing. Black dress pants, about sufficient for her height. The accuracy was interesting in itself since she had been floating for the majority of her interaction with the White Council, yet they had managed to still get her measure in the literal sense.

No shoes. No undergarments. It made no real difference to her since she didn't need any support and she did not excrete anything from her body. She hadn't precisely needed them, even if she still wore them since the very early days, before her body solidified, back when it was more human. More malleable. If she attempted to cut her hair now, she would need tinkertech shears, and even then, they would have no guarantee of working well.

She still remembered Hero's face so long ago when she deliberately slipped up and mentioned something along that effect. A ghost of a ghost of a smile touched her face, barely caressing it before disappearing again into the aether.

"These are passable," she allowed, eye passing up to meet Yu's two brown eyes. Yu averted her gaze, barely allowing Alexandria to peer into her eyes, even for a moment.

"I'm sure the White Council is pleased with your satisfaction," Yu replied, hands around her staff like it was a totem to ward Alexandria away.

Alexandria did not snort, nor did she raise an eyebrow at the wordplay. Instead, she just commanded, "place one of your illusions over me."

"Why?" Yu asked, voice cautious. Her muscles tensed underneath her robes, red nails digging into the flesh of the hand that held her staff.

"So I can change," Alexandria replied, tone politely disinterested.

Yu blinked, eyes snapping down to the clothes and then up again. Her head made a little chicken-headed bobbing motion like she didn't know whether to nod or not and then she raised her staff upward. At first slowly, as she watched Alexandria intently. When Alexandria did not move, not even a single muscle then she moved faster, repeating a rote motion.

Yu's brow furrowed, then two syllables, forming a word, slipped from her pale lips, "Nana!"

Which unfortunately was not nearly enough for Alexandria to discover exactly what language she was speaking. The word itself was pronounced the way it would be in English, but the gravity, which was almost comical, as she said it, seemed to imply something else. It definitely wasn't the invocation of a grandmother, since the world seemed to gain a film over it, a glassy appearance as if viewed through a heavy storm window. The effect deepened until Alexandria and Yu stood obfuscated from sight, light seeming to bend around them.

Sweat beaded at Yu's brow and along the edges of her black hair. She stared at Alexandria with consternation, brow furrowed, as if Alexandria presented some unanswered question.

Alexandria's free hand slipped upward, to the uppermost button of her overcoat. Swiftly and efficiently, with absolutely no wasted motion she undid the buttons and pulled off the overcoat. For a moment she debated whether it would matter if she dropped it, but then noted that it really wouldn't matter overmuch with the dilapidated state of the garment.

She dropped it, however, she did take care not to drop it into one of the rain puddles that dotted the street, even despite the cracks. She dropped the dress pants on top of the overcoat and straightened out the blouse. Taking just a moment to try and smooth out the most egregious wrinkle before slipping the crimson-hued blouse onto her body.

Her long tanned fingers scooped up the pants next, securing them easily. It was morbidly amusing that the White Council had even guessed, or divined the exact perfect waist size. It made Alexandria, even as cross with them as she was, slightly impressed. It was good intel, after all. Good actionable intelligence was close to godliness.

It wasn't enough to excuse their scapegoating and attempted bandwagoning toward throwing Dresden to the Red Court. However, it did make her slightly more favorably inclined toward them, especially since they at least possessed the moral fibre to not completely descend to fear-mongering.

Alexandria flipped her hair, moving it out of the way of the overcoat, which she pulled back over the other two garments. She took special care to make sure her hands wouldn't catch on anything inside the sleeves, since with her strength tearing through the thin cloth would be child's play.

Her lips quirked slightly, gravitating toward the barest hints of a smile. She had been half-inclined to offer the return of Dresden's garment but she doubted he would miss it, especially with how hideous it was.

Of course, wearing the coat made her appear shabby by association, but it was a price she was willing to pay for the increased durability the overcoat seemed to possess. She did leave it unbuttoned, now that she had garments underneath.

Changing in public was not too unfamiliar to her, though usually when she was subject to destructive forces sufficient to scour the tinkertech clothes from her body there was a distinctive lack of civilians to witness her undress. It was a facet of the job, nothing more, nothing less. To be dealt with in a mature fashion as swiftly as possible to maintain the Protectorate image. Nudity around fellow capes was something she was thankfully desensitized too, unlike Eidolon, who probably had any kind of skin showing in public as one of his seven deadly fears.

Alexandria barely shifted her head as she heard a loud chirp. The pixie flitted around, inspecting her new clothes for a moment, tiny gossamer wings beating with hummingbird-esque speed. Her little face seemed quite pleased, and Alexandria turned back toward Yu as the pixie settled on the tall collar of the overcoat and proceeded to gnaw on the fabric with sharp little teeth.

Yu's high cheekbones were stained faintly with pink, but her face was carefully expressionless. Brown eyes examining a swirl in the illusion they were under. Her eyes darted toward Alexandria before she turned to regard her more fully.

"Come," Alexandria said, "Tell me what you know."

The illusion stretched around her, thinning for a moment, before it collapsed into shards of un-light, not unlike chunks of pane glass. For an instant, the effect lingered and then it vanished, not dissolving or subliming, but simply straight-up dematerializing, each piece instantaneously disappearing.

Yu's footsteps were quiet, each step perfectly measured and uniform. She walked as if she had been trained, not fast enough to indicate military or squad training but uniform enough that Alexandria could make note of it. Discipline, then, was an important facet of her life for an extended period of time, and not what was typically regarded as discipline but instead something more rigorous.

Yu remained silent, seemingly ordering her thoughts. Alexandria allowed her the moment.

"Simon Pietrovich is a member of the White Council," Yu said, tone slow, carefully even, "He was the council's expert on the Vampire Courts."

She paused for a breath, face growing more pensive, "He was stationed in Archangel, as Ea- as Warden Baines may have informed you."

"Simon Pietrovich…" Alexandria sounded out, the syllables slipping free from her lips. Now it was Alexandria's turn to be pensive.

"That is a common name, Pietrovich, son of peter," Alexandria continued, tone artificially light and airy, calculated just so that Yu would know her tone was artificial. A statement and tone which indicated her skepticism.

Yu's head bobbed with a nod as she acknowledged Alexandria's statement. She stepped over a crack in the sidewalk as they came to the end of the street. Alexandria very subtly drifted right, and Yu turned, walking down that way, following her direction.

"It is, Lady Alexandria. When Simon Pietrovich chose to be known by his avonymic patronym, it was less common, a more distinguished choice," Yu clarified, voice hesitant, as if she was unsure how much she should really divulge.

Interesting. Alexandria thought idly, considering the information. Another point of data concerning the longevity of the White Council.

"Just call me Alexandria," Alexandria allowed, tone even.

Another voice echoed in her mind, the last time the words, 'call me just' passed her lips.

Call me Rebecca.

It wasn't a pleasant memory, not in retrospect. Not when the memory was tainted by pain. For all Alexandria's vaunted memory, there were some recollections that she wanted to discard. Some things that she could forget if she could. Painful memories.

It only wasn't a torment because she could push the thoughts and memories away as easily as they sought to intrude.

"Archangel is a city of a quarter of a million souls," Alexandria continuing along a differing vein, "I assume the White Council is aware of the last known location of Wizard Pietrovich?"

"The White Council maintained the fortress of Novodvinskaya since-" she paused again, eyes tracking upward to Alexandria by her side before she decided to continue anyway, "-it was granted to them -us, by Nikolay Pavlovich, Grand Duke of Finland."

Nikolay Pavolich? That had interesting connotations. That at least suggested the White Council had been around since the seventeen-hundreds. 'Since' suggested even an even earlier genesis. The question was whether there were more divergences than just occupying a museum fortress in the city of Archangel.

Alexandria was finding the idea of visiting a library more and more attractive. The loss of time would be negligible, but the possible knowledge would be invaluable. It was clear that the supernatural afflicted the natural world, yet America seemed almost indistinguishable from the one she knew, barring the presence of capes.

"Has the White Council been able to examine the site of his presumed death?" Alexandria asked, still in all-business mode. Investigating a murder was actually a novelty. Her deductive skills were rarely put to the task of deciphering murders or plebeian crimes.

Cape on cape murder was usually clear-cut. Simple. Surprisingly straight-forward for how many variables there could actually be. Capes preferred to do the deed in person, even when logic dictated that they should act through proxies. Masters and tinkers preferring to appear in person when they could easily delegate to their minions and creations.

Bastard Son of the Elite was one exception to this rule, but even he sometimes fell into the mistake of wanting to be there and savour the defeat of his enemies in person. Alexandria still smarted under the restriction imposed by Contessa. She had almost got the coward once, but afterward, he had proven surprisingly adept at evading her further attempts.

"No," Yu replied, her pace still carefully measured. Her brown eyes slid around their surroundings, yet again climbing toward the roofs of the buildings. Canvassing for snipers, a learned skill, and one Alexandria did not expect to find in someone with powers.

Before too long a silence followed, Yu continued, "The ways were either collapsed by Baines, or are treacherous for the White Council to pass through."

A shadow seemed to pass over her face, a deep-felt pain. Yu's free hand drifted upward, toward her forearm. Her expression, forced tranquility as it was, still shimmered for the briefest instant with some remembered pain.

Furthermore, 'ways' was emphasized. 'Ways' and their inability to reach Archangel either implied that Russia was completely shut to the White Council or that there were alternate routes to reaching it. Perhaps through the self-same portal power Rashid demonstrated. Perhaps through the translocation teleportation power of the Queen of Winter.

Hence, Alexandria could ask, "And in the real world?"

Yu actually seemed to pause and consider for another instant, frown forming, "The Red Court has embedded itself in many facets of government throughout the former Soviet bloc satellites. The collapse of communism-"

Something passed over her face, irritation mixed with righteousness. A complicated expression, which Alexandria did not see the need to examine in detail, save cataloging it as a data point for later analysis.

"-The collapse of communism let many beasts run amok, many things which would've stayed restrained by the power and reach of the state. Eastern Europe has few isolated strongholds, hidden and hopefully unknown."

"Enemy territory," Alexandria observed, already working on the problem. She was half-tempted to just go there herself. She could fly fast enough and her body was small enough it should barely register on radar as more than an anomaly. Or, it could cause a diplomatic crisis and plunge the Western hemisphere into war if they thought she was a missile.

Scion had destroyed Earth Bet's stockpile of nukes, in what was no doubt a deliberate action to remove them from the playing field. A deliberate move to avoid having the humans destroyed too early to fulfill his nefarious motives.

Earth Aleph still had nukes and had trained more than a few on the information portal between the two Earths. Not that it would do any good. The dimensional membrane that Haywire's device retained, in an uncharacteristic display of restraint, was more than enough to stop both errant fission and fusion weapons. Small mercies for an incident that almost ignited an interdimensional war.

"Quite," Yu smiled a small, shallow, polite smile.

"The amulet that Baines carried, how is that connected to Pietrovich's possible survival?"

Yu frowned, eyes darting left and then right, as she thought for a moment. Her reply came shortly afterward, "I was not made aware of the connection. The only relevant information was that it was enthused with both Pietrovich's magic, an enchantment unknown to the White Council, and darkened by Summer's wellspring."

Summer. Yes, the obvious counterpoint polity to Winter in this strange world, which operated on fairy tale logic. Seelie and Unseelie. Summer and Winter. If this was a fairy tale, Summer would be counterbalanced by its antithesis Winter.

That would be interesting if the fact that Yu lied wasn't more intriguing. The second part was true, or at least Yu believed it was true. The first part, about the connection, was a lie. Either she was aware of the connection or there was no connection. One of those was more likely than the other.

"The White Council has also lost track of Ronald Reuel, the Summer Knight. The coincidence is too great to pass up, especially with Pietrovich's known-" here Yu blushed, almost seeming scandalized, before continuing, "-adversarial relations with the Summer Queen That Is."

Alexandria repressed the shadow of her mirth, deducing that it was more 'dalliances' rather than 'relations' that Yu wished to say, even if one was far from exclusive of the other.

Queen that 'Is' was another point of interest. It implied that there was more than one Queen. It was an awkward designation. Former queen, dowager queen, or acting queen would be more elegant. The choice had to be deliberate then and was probably linked to yet more mythological connotations. The choice of 'queen that is' therefore meant that there was also a 'queen that was,' who was possibly dead and possibly a 'queen that would be,' who was probably a child.

"So find Ronald Reuel and potentially find Pietrovich?" Alexandria mused aloud, floating forward. She came to rest near a crosswalk. Yu, after a moment of indecision, stepped forward to press the crosswalk button. There were no cars, yet Yu waited for the indicator to flash with the image of a walking man before she started across it.

It was odd, admittingly, that a street in Chicago, not far from the city's interior would be deserted. The hour was stretching toward high noon, yet there were none on the street they walked. A rusty red pickup turned down the street ahead, passing them slowly before continuing on down the street shakily.

Alexandria turned her head to follow it as it passed with her single eye.

It was with something like consternation that filled Alexandria an instant later as she heard a shrill scream coming from an alleyway behind them, just off the beaten sidewalk. Yu glanced toward her, seeking some kind of input.

The scream was sharp and piercing, more filled with pain than a cry for help. Yet, Alexandria did not feel like continuing on. She was a hero, damn it, and if evil was happening in front of her she was obliged to stop it. Or break the evil, whichever was better for humanity as a whole.

One moment Alexandria stood next to Yu at the corner of the intersection, watching a lone pickup pass them, the next Alexandria stood at the entrance of the alleyway, overcoat snapping behind her.

She heard the hurried footsteps and sharp breaths of her companion as she hurried to reach Alexandria.

This alleyway was better off, with no broken glass or refuse dotting the concrete floor. No overflowing dumpsters. A puddle of fetid rainwater accumulated down the center of the alley but that was all, besides, of course, the woman.

Alexandria spared the barest fraction of a moment of her accelerated thought to wonder what exactly it was about Chicago's alleyways that her last two meetings were conducted adjacent to their entrances. It made her feel like a drug dealer, honestly. Just a little bit, not that much because she was a superheroine, and saving accosted people in alleyways was practically a staple of superhero fiction.

It was a little surreal though since it had actually been about a decade since she had last responded to something as normal as a scream from an alleyway.

However, this encounter she expected to be anything but normal.

A pale blonde-haired woman, clutched at a bleeding cut, jagged and deep, over her right hamstrings. Thick pink blood seeped forth between what would have been immaculate fingers as she clutched at the wound, keeping pressure on it.

"Damn cat," she hissed venomously, but there was a truly immense amount of fear in her voice, which clashed with the venom. It made her just sound kind of pitiful. A steel knife, short and sweet was clutched in her other hand. A strand of blond hair hung free, disarrayed, from her elaborate coiffure.

The most interesting part about the woman was that Alexandria recognized her. Recognized her from the White Council's convention, since she was the representative of the White Court that shared her table.

The cat? Another obvious reference, especially bearing in mind her earlier conversation with Cat Síth. For some reason, the malk had seen fit to alert her to a stalker. That was what the woman in front of her was, ultimately. It was far too great a coincidence that the White Court would be perfectly situated to follow them if they kept to the ground.

What was even more interesting was that there was some method with which she was being tracked and didn't seem to know it. A potential security risk. Alexandria's countenance darkened.

The White Court vampire lifted her hand away from the wound, which almost seemed to shimmer with silver mercury, filling in the wound with bright pink scar tissue and then flesh. Her pant legs were shredded, marked by claw marks that matched a certain fairy cat.

The woman grunted, a noise which seemed completely inelegant for such a regal looking woman, even marred with blood. Her grey eyes trailed upward, then widened as she caught sight of Alexandria.

Satisfaction warred with fear and relief for an instant, before her eyes darted away and up the side of the building. Alexandria followed her gaze, catching just a glimpse of dark fur at the very top of the brick building near them before it disappeared over the ledge.

Cat Síth then, or there was a panther stalking Chicago's streets that could climb a sheer brick wall. Alexandria knew which of those was more likely, and it was pretty unlikely that a panther would ever get free from the Lincoln Park Zoo.

Alexandria floated into the alleyway, approaching the vampire slowly. Her expression was placid, but inside her anger gnawed at her. Nothing quite managed to push her buttons like the idea of non-humans preying on humans. It was anathema, really. Just as sickening an idea as the agents preying on humanity at the behest of a faux deity.

The only point that stood in the vampire's favor was its human appearance. It was obviously capable of human-level thought and sophistication, which made Alexandria consider whether it was more human than the other seemed to indicate.

The vampire's mouth opened. Then it closed. Silver grey eyes locking on hers and seeming to quail at something about her.

"Why are you following me?" Alexandria demanded curtly. Inwardly, she resolved that until she really should operate under the maxim of 'innocent until proven guilty' but she wasn't sure how much she really cared when humanity was one the line.

"I'm not following you!" the vampire member of House Skavis claimed, trying to look affronted. Her pulse jumped in her thin neck, eyes darting away and around the alley. Her expression seemed to drop as she spotted something behind Alexandria but Alexandria did not bother to turn. She could already hear the sharp breathing of Yu behind her.

"Pants on fire!" The pixie crowed from her spot, still gnawing on Alexandria's collar.

The vampire glanced down at her pants, expression questioning for a moment. Alexandria did let amusement show then since it was such a blatant, panicked lie. It was a cold amusement, coloring her following words with derision.

"I'm sure," she drawled, "what do you want?"

"That's a White Court!" Yu bit out, breath still coming sharply between her gritted teeth. Her jade staff wavered in her hands.

The vampire's attention jumped to the other woman before it jumped back to Alexandria.

"I don't want anything!" Her words were sharp, her eyes kept on gravitating toward Alexandria's ruined eye. Heavy words, somehow weighing on the world, dragging it down. Coloring everything with black and grey, even though its inherent color remained. Making the

Alexandria paused to consider the question, some gravity seeming to color the words. Some kind of inherent nihilism, which made her pause a moment. Some kind of kinship. She didn't really want anything either, did she?

Her purpose was completed, wasn't it? Cauldron had chewed her up, used her, and then discarded her like yesterday's trash when the time was opportune…

It was the human condition

The pixie flitted in front of her face, wings beating in a colorful haze.

"Skavis are despair-eaters," Yu ground out, voice distant like she could barely speak. Literally, tinged with depression so thick Alexandria could practically taste it, "Hope."

Despair compounds depression, depression revolving back into despair. All-consuming, and rotating like an ouroboros.

Despair eater? Emotional manipulation. Ice ran down Alexandria's spine, an alien sensation. It had been years since she felt any kind of temperature sensation.

Why did it matter? Alexandria's thoughts whirred faster and faster. The Endbringers were grinding humanity down. Scion was unbeatable. They had no silver bullet for him like they had for the counterpart. What did it matter even, when the Endbringers would destroy everything, scattering all of humanity into a diaspora…

Hope. She had no hope. Not really. A fool's hope that she knew was a fool's hope. The idea that Cauldron, given enough time, could find the silver bullet. It was a pipe dream. An impossibility. Scion would never give out an actual power that could hurt him, and the possibility of getting power as great as Eidolon and Legend from the remaining harvested fragments seemed like a distant fantasy.

What she did have was determination. To keep going no matter the cost. No matter the obstacles. Always going forward, working toward saving the world, even though it was impossible. She had never given up when faced with the long creeping death of cancer. Even though despair beckoned like a siren call, she still held out, determined to live another day.

Not hoping to live another day, but determined to live another day.

It was determination that flowed through her mind like molten iron. The despair was artificial, she could see in the next moment, how it lay almost insidiously intertwining with her strands of thought. The faster her thoughts flowed, the more gaps the despair had.

The silver-white eyes of the creature in front of her were glazed with fear. She could feel her own expressionless expression staring into the creature in front of her. Her features betrayed none of the crisis of meaning she had just experienced. Her default face was nothing and distracted by her spiraling thoughts she had not thought to change it.

Her long fingers rose, guided by her iron will. The vampire tried to dodge backward, out of reach, but she moved in slow-motion. Even backed by superhuman speed, the vampire was no match for the sheer speed and power of Alexandria's body.

A strangled gasp burst free and then her adamantine fingers closed around the throat of the vampire, lifting her up and off the ground and into the brick alleyway wall behind her.

Pale fingers clawed at her grasp, nailing scratching at her hand fruitlessly. Fingers slick with pink blood, desperately trying to keep Alexandria's grip from sliding completely closed around her windpipe.

The despair slid away, even as it became more heavy-handed, trying to bludgeon her mind into giving in. The more despair tried to cloud her thoughts, the easier it was distinguishable from her own thoughts. It became less and less real, the more her mind became accustomed to the thought strands which weren't her own.

"Cease, if you still like a head attached to your throat," Alexandria whispered, low and dangerous, almost intimately close to the blonde's ear.

Silver-white eyes, shining almost with silver tears met her lone brown eye and widened. Abruptly the despair fell away, dissipating with the gasps of the woman in her hands. She still clawed at Alexandria's hands, trying to keep her own body weight from choking herself. Alexandria tightened her grip just slightly and the struggles ceased, the vampire grabbing onto her overcoat's sleeve with slick fingers.

"The Simurgh. Heartbreaker. Valefor." Alexandria recited, tone dark and heavy. Her eye bore into the eyes of the vampire in front of her as the names left her lips. Glassy incomprehension flittered behind them.

"All Masters. All tried to enthrall me. All failed," Alexandria boasted coldly, "What makes you think you would be different?"

To be true, her standard anti-master speech really didn't work in this situation. Infamous villains of Bet really didn't engender the same respect in a world that didn't know about them. Still, the vampire in front of her seemed to know at least something, based on the way something like horrified comprehension seemed to cross her eyes. Truthfully, it didn't matter. The names were spoken with the gravitas reserved for notable things, notable people. It didn't matter that the vampire didn't know them. What mattered was that Alexandria's tone spoke of the fact that she knew them and the vampire was lesser than them.

There was a crackle and stench of ozone, Alexandria glanced away, back toward Yu, who looked drained. A silver circle gleamed on the concrete around her, a subtle light shining even in the noonday sun. Yu's eyes were framed by deep bags and it looked like she had lost a whole day's worth of sleep in the short while. Her eyes were glazed over with exhaustion but otherwise, she seemed all right.

"White Court. House Skavis," Yu explained, switching her jade staff in her hands. Her voice was shaky, actually cracking as she said 'Skavis.'

Alexandria knew this already, what she didn't know was what it meant. Thankfully, the wizard, or would it be witch, continued, almost in the same tone as someone reciting something by rote or from a textbook, "it feeds on human emotions. In her case, despair."

Yu pursed her lips, thinking for a moment, "Hope is its antithesis. It's poisonous to them."

As the last words slipped free, Yu seemed to blink almost, glaze dissipating marginally, and realized that she had essentially lectured her. Alexandria stared down at her dispassionately as she colored, a blush spreading up her neck. Embarrassed, Alexandria mused. It was valuable information that she thought Alexandria already knew.

Alexandria turned her attention back to the vampire who still fought to keep the weight off her throat. The veins on the white-faced vampire's face bulged. Pink blood vessels burst in her eye. Long fingers, stained pink, one finger missing its painted pink nail, struggled to hold onto Alexandria's arm.

"I should kill you," Alexandria told it, letting it see her visibly consider the idea. Its eyes bulged, even more than it already did and it struggled a moment, straining against her grip, nailing trying and failing to find purchase on Alexandria's hand. A feeble kick slammed into her hip, tearing her right pant leg. Alexandria could feel the heel of the shoe snap as it impacted her invulnerable skin. Her eyes looked desperate, beautiful picture-perfect face coloring with splotches of color as she suffocated in Alexandria's hands.

A blood vessel burst in the other eye, Alexandria relaxed her tightening grip, dropping the vampire to the ground of the alleyway.

The pixie flitted out from behind her ear, rubbing at teary eyes. Alexandria barely spared a moment, the sparse fraction of acknowledgment to the tiny being before she returned her attention to the real threat.

The vampire gasped aloud, spitting a mouthful of blood out onto the grimy floor of the alleyway. Her pale throat was covered in a dark bruise, the shape of Alexandria's hand. Alexandria huffed in derision and let her feet touch the ground. The vampire's eyes flew up to her face and then the vampire backpedaled, ruined foot and intact heel scraping across the concrete.

"I asked once before, and you did not answer except through misdirection and lies," Alexandria stated, "What is your name?"

"She is Cosette Skavis, bastard daughter of a bastard daughter of House Skavis," Yu said derisively, "A representative of House Skavis, specifically selected because she was expendable and as a slight from the lowest of the houses of the White Court to the Council."

Yu's voice started out exhausted but gained strength as additional words joined those she already uttered. Such wordplay was familiar to her, politics was familiar, and she drew strength of will from the familiarity.

"Cosette," Alexandria murmured, amused just slightly, in a very dark way. She stepped closer, feeling the despair tickle at her mind again. She let a very slight frown begin its slide across her face and felt the despair waver and fall away.

"Lowest named member of the House of Skavis," Yu clarified yet again, still refraining to step free from her circle. Her body trembled with some unseen energy, nerves of fear or rage it was hard to tell.

Alexandria considered the creature in front of her and reached a conclusion. Some tools were found in unexpected places after all.

"It's against the Accords! You can't kill me!" The vampire trembled out, trying to seep back into the shadows.

Yu made no comment, merely watched.

"The Unseelie Accords," Alexandria said out loud. It was more a statement than a request for clarification.

"I seem to remember you striking first," Alexandria continued, letting herself smile maliciously, "Emotional manipulation is an attack, is it not?"

"I didn't want to do it!" The vampire, Cosette, scrambled for her knife, a twisted misshapen piece of metal on the ground. Knives tended to do that when faced with Alexandria's skin. A long-standing observation backed up by a metric ton of data-points. Alexandria was also fairly sure Number Man had graphed it at one point too, but that wasn't important.

"You didn't want to do it?" Alexandria replied, musing, trying to parse what that comment exactly meant in that context. It wasn't a denial, for sure, but it was also, shifting the blame, but the words tasted like a lie. Her frantic face and over-clocked heart, the way her eyes shifted to the side, screamed of a lie, a half-lie at best.

"The soif," she whimpered, scrambling for words, trying to explain something, "I was already drawing on my power, then you got in my face! It wasn't my error!"

Vehmancy colored her voice, despite the fear that underlaid it. It was laughable really, blaming Alexandria for her own slip.

"I abhor those who prey on humanity," Alexandria continued slowly, locking eyes with the vampire. The vampire's finger's dug into the brick, leaving stains of pink as it hoisted itself to its feet, leaning against the alleyway wall.

"The Accords!" The vampire tried again, eyes darting around.

"Let me divulge a secret of mine," Alexandria said, voice cast low, stepping closer. The vampire quailed under her attention, seeming to shrink lower.

"I'm not part of the Accords," she whispered and watched the naked fear skirt over Cosette's vampiric features. The White Court vampire tried to bolt, exploding into motion, injured foot smashing into the concrete. Alexandria's hand snapped outward, crushing into her shoulder, arresting the vampire's dash for freedom.

She shuddered, trying to wrest free from Alexandria's grip, to pull away from her iron grip.

Alexandria released her and she crashed back into the fetid water in the middle of the alleyway, struggling to get her feet underneath her.

"The way I see it," Alexandria stated, voice flat, "You will work on my behalf."

Cosette's silver eyes glanced upward, dirty water marring her perfect face. A complicated series of emotions slipped free, dancing around her eyes, not quite graduating enough to break free of her mouth.

Instead it was Yu who spoke, voice careful, "She's White Court."

The words were stated as if they were enough explanation on their own.

The White Court's eyes tracked upward, and Alexandria risked glancing upward as well, to the ledge of the roof above the alleyway. A great malk sat there, pitch black on vanta black fur. Dark claws gouging into the stone. Cat Síth sat watching with unblinking slitted eyes.

The vampire turned back, nodding shakily to Alexandria. Cat Síth's tail twirled, as if he was disappointed, then he seeped away, claws effortlessly dragging through the stone before he disappeared again.

"I have two simple rules for you," Alexandria decided to explain her decision, "You cannot manipulate anyone's emotions, except those I indicate. Second, you will obey my words."

The vampire's eyes flashed to the right and the left, warring with herself, "If I don't?"

Alexandria raised an eyebrow, then gestured with her hand, a slight gesture, indicating the roof above, "That was Cat Síth."

The vampire went even paler than it was, eyes darting back toward the heroine.

Alexandria extended a perfect hand to the vampire. She drew back as if the hand was poisoned for a moment, fighting with herself, before she swallowed, a move that accentuated the dark bruises and then reached out and grabbed Alexandria's hand.

"I worked with monsters," Alexandria said blithely, "True monsters, that found it within themselves to work for the betterment of humanity."

Her mind flashed to Harbinger, the man who became Number Man, and then on to others. It wasn't in her nature to hand out second chances, that was more Legend's purview. Or even Cauldron, but their second chances were oftentimes more aptly acts of enabling.

The creature in front of her fed on humanity, but that didn't mean it couldn't be turned to her purposes.

She turned away, walking back toward Yu, who had a complicated expression on her face, as if she couldn't quite decide whether to be impressed or not.

Once Alexandria was close enough, Yu whispered, "It's a White Court! It will never be able to go against its basic nature!"

Alexandria frowned, taking in the ruined sidewalk and alleyway around them, the way the water flowed to the point of least resistance in the middle.

"It is not in my nature to give second chances," she replied, voice resolute, "I do provide alternate paths for others to take. Whether they take them is irrelevant to me unless they clash with my goals."

Cosette drew closer, hands massaging at her neck, one foot favoring the other.

Alexandria fixed the vampire with a glare, "I consider you a proof of concept."

Left unexplained was what or who was the 'proof of concept.' Alexandria preferred it that way.

"Multiple times I've clashed with things that sought to end all of humanity, in all those fights I endured," she continued, "Always for humanity and the greater good."

Alexandria finally turned away from the vampire, "If she harms a human without good reason, I will end her. She should pray that I don't find her wanting."

There was a moment of silence which stretched on as Alexandria considered her choice. She could hear the harsh breaths of both woman in the sudden quiet. A moment's attention was all that was needed to bring the sound of their heartbeats to the fore. Both stressed, both's heart thumped away above the average beats per minute.

Yu was correct, it was fundamentally a heavy risk to involve the vampire. Yet, it was also clear that this world was filled with enemies.

The White Court vampire at least appeared superficially human, something that could not be said for the chiropteran Red Court. Alexandria had been unbending for most of her life, but even she could recognize a useful power. If she could bend that toward the enemies of humanity, then it could be useful. Once its use ran out, or she was forced to choose between it or humanity the choice was clear. Until then, it could be useful.

A simple, cold, calculus. The same cold calculus that led her to listen to Contessa when she recommended taking the long route, letting a villain slip by unseen but not unnoticed. Atrocities committed for the greater good. Alexandria did not have Contessa with her now to guide her, but even she could recognize someone useful.

Cosette Skavis was a desperate woman. The lowest member, of the lowest component of a tri-part polity. Her agreement was borne by fear at the moment, but it was also clear the emotional desperation visible in her gaze.

Alexandria wondered exactly how a polity of despair eating creatures organized their hierarchy. A primitive free-for-all? By blood rights? By seeing who would give in to despair the quickest?

Any of the three seemed a useful way to wrest control of the vampire away from the White Court. Once she unraveled the first thread, the rest could follow.

"It will take me four minutes to reach Archangel," Alexandria stated, floating back around, overcoat snapping with the motion. She continued after a moment, "I doubt the investigation will take longer than an hour. Something to think about."

Then she lifted into the air, pixie trailing by her side, wings beating like a hummingbird, and ascended into the sky.

She spared one glance back. Yu stood within her circle, jade staff clutched in her hands. Cosette outside, seeming shaken, a dark bruise already fading along her throat.

Chicago stretched in front of her, the horizon filled with life and cars. She headed north, careful to fly slowly within city limits as she ascended. A man atop a roof, reclining on a sun chair with a mug of coffee in his hands did a double-take, newspaper dropping from his hand.

Alexandria raised an eyebrow and offered a slight dismissive wave as the pixie performed a form perfect pirouette next to her. The man didn't seem to even register the pixie, just continued to stare at her form as she floated away northward.

I-94 passed below her, jam-packed with cars. She was already high enough that only the most attentive would notice her. Her eyes scanned the city, taking in the sight of the unmarked city.

As she noted before, it was a heady sensation to see a Chicago so intact. The last time she had visited any Chicago it had been Bet's during Malcolm's, Myrddin's, funeral. Cold anger ran through her like it always did when she thought of his death. Brockton Bay was a refuse heap, and Echidna was only the last symptom of a dysfunctional system.

She loathed Docter Mother's asinine idea of justifying Cauldron's inactivity in Brockton Bay. A directive that led to Myrddin's demise. Parahuman feudalism didn't need to be observed in Brockton Bay, all they really needed to do was look to the warlords of Africa to see how things would ultimately play out. Feudalism wasn't even sustainable, it stifled development due to fear.

Still, her eyes tracked northwest, searching for an instant, eyes flitting over buildings until she found the one she was looking for. The site of Myrddin's funeral service, a Catholic Church. She knew it by sight, despite never setting foot in it.

It had been decades since she actually entered a Church. She hadn't gone since she was diagnosed with cancer, some small part of her rebelling at the idea of forgiving God for what he had inflicted her with.

Later, she didn't have time. Regardless, her religious inclinations had withered and died as she observed the world. What kind of God would permit Scion and the counterpart to ravage Earth? To give out the blessing of destructive powers to many that least deserved it? For, every poor individual that was granted power in their hour of need was broken irreparably. It didn't matter the quality of the therapist, few capes were ever restored to full functionality.

No, long ago, Alexandria had concluded that if there was a God, then he was indifferent. Yet, the notion gnawed at her. She never felt physical discomfort anymore. She could discard her doubts with only effort of will.

Myrddin, despite being a believer that powers were magic, had also believed in God. Myrddin was also someone who she considered a friend. She had been too busy to attend his funeral. In the midst of scrambling to defend her position as Chief Director of the PRT, to prevent all of Cauldron's machinations from going up like so much smoke.

Directives from Contessa came like clockwork that entire day, countless fires put out before they became blazing conflagrations. Some even threatened to consume the entire world. Still, she missed the ceremony of a man she considered one of her only friends in the entire world. Eidolon, for all his stupid fake abs, Legend and his goofy smile, Myrddin with the crazy theories which he had to know were completely ludicrous.

Alexandria hesitated, staring at the church. It was called St. Mary of the Angels, she recalled, remembering Legend's words, on the corner of Cortland and Hermitage, Chicago. As if she didn't already know all of Chicago's streets from above by memory. As if she would actually need to take a car or fly to get there, she would've just taken one of Doormaker's portals. In and out, just long enough for the eulogy.

The front of the church was polished white columns, side by side in groups of two to make a total of eight. Alexandria's bare feet touched the ground. The chill was dull, more academic than anything else against her feet. Her ability to discern temperature was still present, but her body dulled the sensation.

The heavy oaken doors were closed. For an instant, Alexandria wanted them to be locked, so that she could justify continuing her task unbothered by her guilty conscience. She stepped forward slightly. Some long-forgotten pious part of her whispered, saying that flying would be disrespectful. She imagined it was something that her mother would say and that really smarted.

Her fingers closed around the brass door handle. For a pregnant moment, she paused, imagining just flying away again before she grit her teeth subtly and pulled the door open. The door pulled open easily, and Alexandria stepped around it, into the church.

Like the cold stone tiles outside, Alexandria barely felt the red rug within the narthex. With quiet, almost reverent but not quite, Alexandria stepped into the church's nave, passing between two angel statues, one robed in pink the other in white, each clutching at large clam shells filled with holy water.

Alexandria did not bless herself. She did not make the sign of the cross, or anything else like that. Instead, she stood stoically for a moment, looking over the empty interior. It was pretty, in the classical sense. Beautiful statues and stained glass, and the hard wooden pews she remembered from her similar churches during her childhood.

She slipped into a pew, sliding down a kneeler and knelt, not sure what she should be feeling. She had to admit that she was disappointed. She expected some kind of fulfillment, something to alleviate the guilt that she felt about missing the funeral of one of her closest friends. There was nothing, not really, just that self-same emptiness.

Back before everything she remembered the little prayer she used to say, for everything to be good in the whole world.

_A fool's dream._

Short measured steps passed behind her, someone walking with a modicum of stealth. She turned slightly, hands still resting against the back of the pew in front of her.

The first thing she registered was the black cassock and then the Roman collar. This was the priest then. His hair was greying, but not threatened yet by baldness. Wire rimmed glasses graced a slim nose. Behind the glasses, sharp blue eyes stared into her eye.

The priest seemed to regard her for a beat then he furrowed his brow, eyes tracing over her missing eye.

"Hello, I'm Father Forthill," he said softly, eyes still locked on hers, "Can I assist you with anything?"

Alexandria turned her attention back toward the altar, suddenly not sure what to say. She had to admit that was a novel experience for her, the usually erudite member of the triumvirate. Not the most personable, that would be Legend. Instead, she had always been the one with the probing comment, the sharp observation right when it was needed.

"My friend's funeral was here once," Alexandria replied, tone somber. Inwardly, she debated the merits of sharing the information. All her life she kept her cards close to her vest, never letting an iota of her thoughts share unintended. This was a new life, with a new purpose.

She didn't believe in God, not really. But she did believe in second chances. She had been granted one twice if she looked at it a certain way. The question really was, what kind of person she wanted to be.

"What was his name? Or her?" Father Forthill replied equally softly.

"Malcolm, but he went by Myrddin," Alexandria said.

Father Forthill hummed, "Is that what is troubling you?"

"No," Alexandria responded, and now it was her turn to wrestle with herself.

"I fought monsters, Father, and along the way, I think I may have become a monster."

The priest was quiet, considering her words, "Nietzsche had many things to say, some of it profound, other parts more dangerous. Have you done good in the world?"

"Yes," Alexandria replied. She turned to face the priest again. His expression was unscrupulous, but something like understanding burned behind his eyes.

"God does not ask what we did, but how we will change going forward," he replied, "We tell him what we did, and ask for forgiveness."

Alexandria snorted in derision, scorn seeming to drip from her voice, "I choked a woman almost to death. I forced a young girl into trying to kill me because she feared I killed her friends. I lied to the world for the greater good, covered up atrocities greater than the sum fears of man. I'm not a good person."

It would once have been unthinkable that such words would slip free from her. For decades she maintained an immaculate dark knight image. Everyone knew she performed dark deeds but the public couldn't prove a thing. Even a year ago she wouldn't have dreamed of sharing a secret with anyone, not even a priest. Now was different. She was thrust into a world not her own. A world where nobody knew of her or her actions.

Once, she had yelled out to the world the immortal words, "I want to be a hero!" Once they had been true. Now her hands were stained. Did she take it back? No, the sins she committed were for the greater good. Someday, long in the future, she could find redemption when her work was done. Or she would die before that day came.

Father Forthill looked at her, blue eyes intense beneath his wire-rimmed glasses. A little frown played across his aged features.

"Nobody is beyond forgiveness, no matter the weight of their sins," Father Forthill raised his eyes to the cross above the altar.

Alexandria's thoughts spiraled around and around as she raised up her eyes to the cross. She didn't seek forgiveness. She didn't want understanding.

_What she had done._

_She wasn't sorry._

_She would do it all again._


End file.
